To Get Back Life
by gracie5412
Summary: Postwar, Muggleborns are running for their lives, Running from Voldemort, from Slavery. Hermione Granger is running, But when her hopes of escaping England go out the window. Who is there left to save her? HGDM COMPLETE
1. Hermione

**To Get Back Life**

**Summary:** All the Muggle-borns are being killed or sold as slaves to the pure blooded families. Will Hermione be able to escape the country that believes that she should be dead just because of her blood? Will the one person she has never trusted be the only one that can save her? HG/DM

**Disclaimer for whole story: **I do not own and of the characters, places, events etc. that appear in the Harry Potter series. I am gaining no profit from this story nor will I ever.

* * *

_**Chapter 1  
**__**Hermione**_

The soles of her thin, tattered shoes slapped against the rough cobbled street, feeling every sharp pebble jab into her foot through them, sending echoes bouncing off the crumbling walls. She was in the old part of town, almost completely deserted nowadays; it was where the Muggle-borns had lived before all the 'bad stuff' had happened. Before Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived, had been killed The Dark Lord in the final battle. Before the towns had been raided and people had been dragged kicking and screaming from their burning houses to be packed on to a wagon already overfilled with people to be taken like cattle to the slaughter.

It seemed like she had been running for hours and hours on end, of course, for all she knew, she could have been as paying attention to the clock hadn't really been a high priority. She had more pressing this on her mind to focus on, staying alive for instance.

They were still on her tail; she knew they were, she could still hear them, their shouts catching up with her from behind from time to time. Sometimes they were barely audible; a faint mumble, actual words that couldn't actually be picked out, but sometimes they were panicking-ly close by, just around the bend she had taken seconds ago.

The only small glimmer of hope that she picked out of what was going on was that at least the Dementors weren't chasing her. She had lost count of the amount of people to give up all hope and give in when it was the hooded monsters that were following them. _Always look for the positive in all situations, _that's what her father had always told her and that's what she was trying to, even if she had been being chased for the past two weeks straight. He was a smart one, her father, now he was also, unfortunately dead. He had been pulled into the magical world when Hermione had received her letter; he was muggle through and through. This made Hermione feel very guilty, as, if it wasn't for her being a witch both of her parents would still be alive and with her.

As she ran an arm shot out and grabbed her, the other covered her mouth to stifle the loud and fearful scream that emerged from her dry, cracked lips. They stayed pressed against the cold, damp wall, shrouded by the shadows until the Deatheaters had sprinted past and their footsteps and shouts could no longer be heard. Only then was she released. Once she was out of the arms that had been trapping her she spun around and whipped out her wand, pointing it at the stranger.

"My, my so very young, only just coming into adult-hood! You are Hermione Granger correct? You have changed since I last saw pictures of you." The figure said.

"Yes," she replied, "Yes I'm Hermione Granger, what's it to you?" eyeing the person who had grabbed her, from behind her wand.

A woman with short, messy, dark brown hair with wisps of grey running through it stood before her. Her robes were a colour that used to be black but had faded over the years and had many patches sewn on to cover the rips and tares.

"I'm here to help you. Don't you worry lovey, we'll look after you now." The woman said, ignoring the wand that was still being pointed at her throat. "I'm Margaret by the way, now follow me."

The Deatheaters were back again, Hermione could hear them drawing closer to the alley where they were hid. Her heart quickened its pace significantly, she looked around her; there was no way out of the alley except back on to the main street; right into the path of her pursuers. It was this fact alone that made her lower her wand and follow Margaret.

The two slipped down the dark alley, keeping to the shadows so they would not been seen if anyone happen to glance down the street. Once they got to the end Margaret pulled out her wand and tapped her wand three times against a brick about waist height. The wall magically opened up, though not as impressively as the wall from the Leaky Cauldron that led to Diagon Alley, and the pair rushed through before the bricks sealed behind them.

The passage that they ran into was too dark to be able to see much more than a few inches in front of your face, but Margaret grabbed Hermione's hand and pulled her along behind her without even bothering to light her wand. Finally a thin bead of light appeared a long way off that grew slowly bigger and bigger.

The light turned into a small, dimly lit, room. It had two battered sofas, covered in even more patches that Margaret's robes; a small bookcase, filled with many dusty, tattered books; six candles chunky candles were dotted around the room offering the only light to the room. A dinning room table sat in the corner and the four chairs that were pulled up to it were all mismatched, a door led into a small hallway, which connected a small bathroom and a room containing several beds.

"You can stay here tonight, with us, and we'll see how far we can get you tomorrow." Margaret informed her.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked.

"It's what we do, lovey, me and many others around the country, some of us Muggle-borns or Half-bloods and some are even Pure-bloods. You'll travel up the country to Scotland. There is a portal there that transports all that's on the platform over to France. It goes once every night. Once you're over there you're free!"

"Is it really that easy?" Hermione asked, with wonder.

"Well no, not easy at all really, the Dementors might detect you or, from time to time, Deatheaters get tip offs and raid the safe houses, you don't want to be there when that happens and even the portal isn't safe it's one of the most heavily guarded things in that part of the country." Margaret explained with a grave expression, it was obvious that she had experienced some of these things first hand.

"Anyway," She continued, her tome brightening hugely as the subject was changed. "I'll get hold of a few of my contacts in nearby towns and see who can take you into their house."

"Thank you." Hermione sighed and flopped down on one of the sofas, able to relax a little now she knew that this woman was to do her no harm and there was no immediate danger of a Deatheater finding her. She allowed her lips to smile a little as she thought of the escape plan that was opening up before her.

"You must be starving, lovey, I'll make you a nice bowl of soup." Margaret smiled warmly and walked over to a pot that hung over the crackling fire.

A few minutes later a bowl of steaming hot chicken soup was set down before her on the table. Hermione tucked in greedily, helping herself to the bread rolls that were piled high on a large plate set next to her.

* * *

An hour later Hermione was completely exhausted, she had been running for days and it was taking its toll on her now she was finally able to rest. She despised Voldemort for putting her through all this. She remembered him well, it being only two years since she was up against him in the final battle, taking place at Hogwarts once Dumbledore had been captured. She had been one of the lucky ones who had escaped using one of the many secret passages the led out of the school. For the last year she had been on constant look out for the many prowling Deatheaters and Dementors that were eager to spill her, in their eyes, _dirty _blood. In the battle Harry had died, leaving Voldemort free to take charge of the country with no real threats in his way. A few months later Ron went missing, he was wanted too, although he was a pureblood he was a non-conformist, this was an offence punishable by death.

The room fell silent as the door opened. A tall dark haired man walked into the room wearing a robe pulled over, plain, Muggle clothing, faded black jeans and a dark grey t-shirt.

"Oh Joe! It's you!" Margaret exclaimed, heaving a sigh of relief.

"Of course it's me Margie, who else would it be?" He chuckled and grabbed a roll of bread from the table where Hermione sat. He gave her a brief nod to acknowledge that he saw her and muttered "Hey".

"Joe you should be wearing those clothes!" Margaret nagged.

Joe simply laughed and batted away her concerns "Margie you know how very careful I am, I'll never get caught."

"Oh, Hermione this is Joe." Margaret said suddenly remembering that the pair had never met so didn't know each other. "Joe this is Hermione, she's staying here tonight. Joe's been here for a month now."

"Just can't bring myself to leave." He interrupted with a laugh, but Hermione thought she could see a hint of sadness in his eyes. "So you're the famous Hermione Granger? What was it like being there at the final battle?"

"Leave the poor love alone Joe!" Margaret instructed. "You must be so tired Mione, you go on to bed, we can talk in the morning."

Hermione smiled gratefully and made her way into the bedroom. Once there she collapsed onto the nearest bed. When she curled up on the lumpy mattress underneath the scratchy sheets it felt, to her, like the softest thing in the world, compared to the stone floors she had been sleeping on at least.

* * *

The night passed in the blink of an eyes and it didn't feel like two minutes had passed when Margaret gently shook her awake.

"Time for breakfast lovey." She told Hermione as her eyes open and she left her peaceful dreams to enter back into reality.

Ten minutes later, once she had washed and dressed, she stumbled into the living room and sat on one of the battered, overstuffed sofas. Joe strolled into a few minutes later to join them and sat down next to Hermione while they waited for Margaret to serve up breakfast.

When they were finally sat down on the rickety chairs tucking into bowls of porridge Joe started to grill her.

"So will you tell me now? What it was like?" He asked again, talking around the food that was crammed into his mouth.

"Leave the poor child alone Joe!" Margaret snapped.

"No, it's ok, I don't mind." Hermione reassured her before answering the question Joe had asked, "I remember that we were in Hogwarts, on the Astronomy Tower, good position, you could see anyone coming in any direction and too small to fit all the death eaters on. Voldemort appeared and started the attack. It was Harry, Ron and I, plus a few others that Harry said were strong enough to fight. The order members were down stairs dealing with the other death eaters. Soon it was just Harry, me, Ron and Voldemort left the others were all dead. Harry told us to go but we didn't want to, he insisted until we did. We left to help in the grounds. All I remember is a great flash of light and Harry's body falling from the tower. I don't know if he was dead before the fall or because of it. The spell might of hit him or he might have been trying to avoid it and didn't know he was so close to the edge. Ron and I escaped through a secret passage in the grounds and Ron disappeared shortly after, I've been in hiding since."

"Well at least you're with us now then." He said brightly, he sounded very impressed by the tale.

"Not for long though. You're moving on tonight Mione." Margaret informed her.

"What already?" Hermione asked, very shocked.

"Sometimes you can move very fast, depends on where has a space free. Some places only house females and some only males." Joe explained, "Sometimes you get lucky and a place will open up for you really quickly."

She now understood why he had looked so sad before; she guessed that after a month of waiting for a place he would be disheartened that he would ever get the opportunity to move on.

_It must feel horrible_, She thought, _not knowing if you were ever going to escape this awful, terrible place. _

"You'll catch a train tonight at eleven. You'll be able to hide, but you have t get off at the next stop as the check the train at every platform. They cannot find you ok?" Margaret told her.

* * *

That evening Joe accompanied Hermione to the station to check that she got onto the train with no hassle.

"When you get onto the train hide somewhere, wait for about ten minutes then you can go out into one of the carriages, they should have checked passports by then." He explained.

"Thanks Joe." She said genuinely.

"No problem, oh yeah Margie told me to give you this." He said and handed her a small rucksack filled with seem-bursting amounts full of delicious looking food. "Just some things for the journey."

"Do you think there's enough?" Hermione joked as she took the bag from him.

The boarding whistle rung around the platform and Joe sighed, "Good luck kid."

"I'm not a kid I'm nineteen!" She protested.

"Exactly and I'm twenty-nine, to me you're still a kid." He told her with a grin. "Now you better be going, Margie will kill me if you miss your train. I'll see you in France when we both get over there."

Hermione quickly ran onto the train and found that she was very thankful that she was still quite small for her age as she could curl up in the luggage compartment. The only glitch to the plan was that she didn't own a watch and therefore had no way of telling when ten minutes had passed.

_I can tell when ten minutes are up, _she thought as the train whirred into motion, _how hard could it be? _

* * *

After what she guessed was ten minutes she slipped back into a compartment and quickly took a spare window seat by a large woman dressed in red robes that made Hermione decide that she looked like a bus.

What she heard next made her heart jump up into her throat in sheer terror.

"Passports at the ready! Passports at the ready!" A deatheaters was calling as he made his way up the aisle.

She looked around frantically searching for a way out of the trap that she was now in. but there was another Deatheater coming down the aisle in the opposite direction, blocking off her only escape route. She sat like a mouse waiting for the cat that was stalking towards her to pounce.

Then she saw it, the small, brown, leather book, sticking out of the pillar box red handbag belonging to the bus-like woman beside her, just inches away from Hermione's twitching fingers. Quietly she unscrewed that flask that contained pumpkin juice that Margaret had put into the rucksack. With a fake gasp of surprise she jerked her arm and the liquid splattered all over the woman's red shoes, that were obviously too tight as her ankle fat was rolling over the straps. The woman shrieked and as she was trying to clean it off her stockings Hermione quickly pulled the passport out of the bag and slipped it inside the pocket sewn into her robes.

"Can I see you passport please Madam?" The Deatheater asked, as he got to their seats. Hermione said nothing but pretended to be looking through her bag for hers.

"Certainly sir." The red lady said and pulled open her bag. "Oh dear, I can't seem to find it." She declared after searching for a few moments.

At those words the whole carriage fell silent and attention was turned to them. The other deatheater came over and joined them.

"If you could come with us please madam." He said quietly and took the lady by the arms and escorted her down the carriage having to use a lot of force to get her to keep walking. The other Deatheater quickly followed. Hermione sunk back into her chair heaving a silent sigh of relief.

She was safe, for now at least.


	2. Draco

**To Get Back Life**

_**Chapter 2  
**__**Draco

* * *

**_

The marble floor cooled his feet as he walked across it with no shoes or socks. It was a pleasant contrast from the heat that the concrete had soaked up from the glaring sun outside. He was wearing clothing that wizards had made to blend in with the Muggles if they had to leave the Wizarding world. It was almost identical to that sold in Muggle shops apart from the fact that the label flashed different colours when you read it. He had on deep blue jean and a green t-shirt.

The only distinctive Wizarding object that he had upon him was the amulet that he had to wear at all times. It was what repelled Dementors; every Pureblood in the country possessed one. It was what kept them alive.

With a loud 'pop' his father appeared in the room, still wearing the uniform of the Deatheater, a black robe with the hood pull up and a mask to hide his facial features. Although not many of the Deatheaters wore that masks when they were out hunting they were still made to when they had meetings with the Dark Lord.

_That's where he's been,_ Draco thought, _and he's probably spoken about me and the others had given him more ideas of ways to get me to join. _

As usual, Draco was right about his father.

"Boy, come into my study." His father barked and he silently followed that old man that he hated so much.

Inside Lucias Malfoy took a seat in the high-backed chair that sat behind the desk before motioning his son to take the chair opposite. Draco quickly did as he was told.

"I've been talking to some of my colleagues and their boys have all joined up and got their mark. One's only fifteen but he was so eager The Dark Lord allowed him to join. How do you think I felt having to make up excuses as to why you still have a bare arm? They won't believe your focusing on your education for much longer you know boy!" He yelled at his son.

"I'm not getting the Mark." Draco said quietly, through clenched teeth.

_Whack_, the cane that Mr Malfoy carried had been brought down on the knuckles of Draco's left hand that had been resting upon the desk.

"You think you're too good for us do you?" He yelled, standing up to use advantage of his height, "Think you're too good for the Dark Lord?"

"No father. I just don't see how killing people will do our country any good." Draco told him, using the same explanation he did whenever they had this argument.

"Mudbloods too good for being killed! Oh that's rich. They are worthless boy; we're doing the world favour to get rid of them all. They're not like us; they shouldn't be allowed to have magic if they haven't got the heritage. It's bad blood." Lucias Malfoy snapped before ordering his son to leave and telling him that the matter wasn't over.

He went up to his large bedroom containing a four-poster bed with deep green sheets, a redwood desk with a pot of large eagle quills and neat stacks of parchment upon it, bookcases with old books on the history of magic and all the ones that he had brought back from school when he had left two years before, he had gone away to Hogwarts. The room was very dark and grown-up, not at all what you would picture a nineteen-year-old boy's room to look like.

But he had never really been allowed a childhood, he had always been expected to follow orders and behave. As a toddler he was told off for speaking out of turn and at seven he had been sent to a boarding school for young wizards, only coming home for the summer. He had then gone to Hogwarts at the age of eleven and as the Deatheaters started to plot their second war his father had tried to bully him into joining.

Standing strong Draco had firmly refused every time his Father had brought up the subject. This was not a good idea, Draco knew, as some of the things they did to the Pure-bloods that didn't not join the Deatheaters ranks were worse than what they did to the Muggle-borns and Half-bloods. His parents knew this too and that was why whenever the subject of his son was brought up Lucias Malfoy made excuses to put off telling them that his son was a Mudblood lover.

Draco's mother, Narcissa Malfoy, was also from a long line of Purebloods and was also a Deatheater, although she didn't go out on hunts as his father did. She visited Riddle House often and spoke with The Dark Lord.

He had, of course met Voldemort and hated the sight of him. His was shockingly thin and frail looking but very powerful and strong. His eyes still matched those of a snake yet were blood red. His skin, so pale it was almost white and his voice made terror run through Draco's body.

* * *

Hours later he was still in his room, lay upon the bed staring at the canopy above him. With a swift knock his mother walked in and he scrambled to his feet. He quelled the feelings or hate and rage as she walked over to him. She was tall, very thin and had the iciest eyes he could ever imagine. It was hard to think of her as a mother when she looked so hard, tough and downright scary at all times.

"Draco, your father tells me that you have shouted at him again." She spoke in her chilling tone, her voice may have been quiet but it was also filled with disgust and bitterness. It was a voice that you would always listen to for fear of what she would do if you didn't.

"Yes Mother." He whispered hoarsely hanging his head so he wouldn't have to look at her face.

"Why must you be so awkward? Why must you be such a disappointment? Why can't you be more like Thomas?" She asked as she had done so many times before.

Thomas, Draco's cousin, was three years older. A Deatheater at sixteen; killed more Mudbloods than anyone could ever remember, just twenty-one and already married to a pureblooded woman with a highly regarded also with the name Malfoy and had already brought a son into the world to carry it on. What more could an aunt and uncle ask for in a nephew? Except maybe that there own son would follow the example.

"I'm not my bloody cousin I'm _so _sorry if that disappoints you! Maybe I should just move out?" Draco hissed.

"You will do not such thing! If you move out we won't be able to answer for you and you'll go and get yourself killed by pointing out your ridiculous views on the world." She snapped.

Draco sighed and shrugged his shoulders. He was at a loss, they didn't want him to be the way he was but he wasn't going to change and they didn't want him to move out but they hated him being around. How could he fight that?

"Your dear cousin and his family will be coming to stay in a month and the Dark Lord shall be gracing us with his presence." She informed him, "I suggest that you have changed your attitude by then before you put the family name in disgrace."

She then turned and stalked out of the room closing the door firmly behind her.

* * *

The next morning Draco awoke early to the sound of tapping at his large bedroom window. He pulled back the thick, green blinds and revealed his large eagle owl, Mercury, sat on the ledge knocking its beak against the glass to get his attention.

"Alright, alright I'm coming hold on to your tail feathers!" He grumbled as he crossed the room to the window. He opened it up and the owl swooped in circled the room twice before landing on the desk.

Draco took the letter from its beak with a grin he had been anticipating it for a long time and was glad to finally get a reply. But as he turned the letter over his smile faltered and then faded all together. This was not a reply from Cassandra, the Muggle-born girl he had befriended one summer when he was staying away from home. This was the letter that he had sent to her a week ago, unopened the wax seal still in tact.

This could mean only one thing, Mercury was one of the best breed of owl in the world and had never failed to deliver a letter; this meant that Cassandra was dead.

"No, not you too Cass, please not you!" He pleaded into empty room.

Quickly grabbing his wand he disapperated, appearing a few seconds later outside a block of houses. He entered one without knocking and made his way round the house he knew very well. Starting at the top of the house he worked his way down searching each and every room.

Draco paused briefly inside her bedroom, even though he knew it would be empty. There were clothes tossed on the floor like usual as Cassandra could never be bothered to hang them up again. Her desk was covered in lip-glosses, mascaras, eye shadows and many more tubes of make-up. The room still looked lived in, that gave him a tiny glimmer of hope.

Only in the basement was this hope fully distinguished. He found a boy around fourteen curled up in a tiny hole. He was still alive thankfully and Draco was able to get him to come out.

"What happened?" He demanded.

"They came and took Abby and Ruben one night Cassandra was down here with me, she told me to hind and not to come out until she got back for me. There was a lot of shouting but I didn't come out. She's not coming back is she?" The boy asked solemnly.

"No I don't think so." Draco said with a sigh. "Have you got somewhere you can go? I would offer you a place to stay but my parents are Deatheaters so that wouldn't go too well."

Once reassured that the boy would be safe Draco apperated back to his room ready to start the day. On the outside he was the same as ever but on the inside his mind was churning. He'd never really thought much about the deaths of the Muggle-borns apart from that it shouldn't happen. He being pureblooded would never experience it so he could never imagine what it would feel like. But now he had lost a close friend and now he was even more determined to help these people not hurt them.

He had been writing to Cassandra for three years, he had met her at his friend Jake's house when he stayed there one summer to escape the ever-disapproving looks from his parents. She was Jake's next-door neighbour so she had spent time with them, playing Quidditch or going to Diagon Alley and sometimes Hogsmade. They had become fast friends. Cassandra had a spark of optimism that Draco had never encountered before. It was a welcome change.

She was the one that Draco voiced all of his concerns to, told his true feelings about his family and how they felt about him. He was open to the fact that his family was close to the Dark Lord and was comfortable discussing it as Cassandra knew that he did not share in these prejudices. And in return she told him about her dreams to get out of England and move to a country where they did not judge you on your parentage, somewhere where she could get a job and not be held back because of her blood.

Although they lived miles and miles apart they stayed in touch through letters they exchanged every week. But over the past few months the letters on Cassandra's part had become less frequent as the Deatheaters became more and more thorough with their searches so Cassandra's family had built a safe house underground that they spent time in when the threat came too close. This meant that it took a while for her to get the letter and send a reply. But Mercury always delivered it to her so Draco would know that she was ok.

Now his only true friend was dead. Killed by people like his parents. Bye the people that they wanted him to be. It felt to him like it was his fault. He could have prevented it some way.

'What ifs' ran through his mind confusing and depressing him.

_What if I had hidden her?_

_What if I had given her my amulet, she could have pretended to be a pureblood? _

_What if I had fallen in love with her? We could have gotten away from this place and she wouldn't be dead by now. _

The last was ridiculous though, he knew that he would never love Cassandra and she would never love him. It just wasn't that type of relationship that they had, but it was still idealistic that they could have escaped from the horrible country that surrounded him.

_But maybe I can still make it; _the thought hit him as he sat alone mourning the loss of his best friend, _what is there for me to stay for? I have no ties that I can't break; I have nothing to hold me back. I don't care what my family think about it; once I'm gone I never have to see them again. _

So a plan began to form in Draco's mind. He did not know how, where or when he would go but he knew that he defiantly would. And he'd go as soon as he could manage it.

But having the parents he did he knew that he needed to plan this out strategically, he couldn't be spontaneous, he could just up and leave. He needed to know he would be safe and that he would have security where ever he went.

Fir this he would need money, travel plans, clothes, a place to stay, a job at where ever he was going. It would take a while but it would be worth it. If he did it properly he would never have to come back into England again. He would never be forced to become a Deatheater. He wouldn't have to wear the stupid amulet at all time he would have to carry an identity card, birth certificate and passport just in case he got stopped by an authority figure in the street.

It soothed him, just thinking about all of it, what he would do, how he would do it. But what gave him pure unbridled pleasure was picturing the looks of anger that his parents would wear. The shame they would go through when their friends found out that their son was not a supporter of the Dark Lord, would not be joining the Deatheaters' ranks. It gave him the power to start the plans.

The first thing he did was to go down to the library where the grand fireplace was set into the wall behind the desk. A fire always roared in the hearth as a quick way of travel and an old antique pot sat on the mantel above it. It contained Floo power; Draco grabbed a handful and threw it into the flames that quickly turned green. He stepped inside them, enjoying the way the flick against his skin, and declared his destination in a clear but quiet voice. He did not want anyone to overhear.

"Gringotts Bank." He said firmly and a second later he was pushed into motion.

Soon the dizzying journey came to an end and he stepped out into the bustling bank. He walked over to a desk where a goblin sat reading through papers.

"May I help you sir?" It asked as he approached.

"Yes I would like to take out my own bank account. I am currently sharing one with my parents but would like one of my own." Draco told him confidently as he could, he couldn't help it but the workers of Gringotts had always unnerved him, it was their cruel eyes and spindly fingers.

"Certainly sir, if you would like to fill in this form, just a few details, and we can cut you a key." The goblin informed him as he pushed a form and a large quill from a peacock feather over the desk.

"Oh, but could you not tell my parents about this, it's a surprise." He said anxiously.

"Of course Sir, we are always discreet." The goblin reassured him with a sly smile.


	3. Dementors

**To Get Back Life**

Thanks –  
**londonmalfoy **- thank you for being my only reviewer to the last chapter!

**A/N **so seeing as how harldy anyone is reading this I might remove it. What do think? Let me know if you're reading this and liking it please!

* * *

_**Chapter 3  
**__**Dementors**_

Hermione was at the doors before they even opened as it pulled up at the station just an hour later. She was the first one onto the platform and had slipped out the doors before most people were getting ready to greet the loved ones that had come to meet them. There was no one there for her, of course, she knew there wouldn't be. That would be stupid, for someone to meet her, the less muggle borns that were out in the open, the less chance the Deatheaters would have to catch them.

She pulled out the crumpled piece of paper out of her pocket; thankful that it hadn't burrowed into one of the holes and dropped out onto one of the seats and was now trundling away from her. Although, from the amount of times she had looked at it, she was sure that she knew it off by heart. It was directions to the next place she would be staying in. just the names of the roads that she would have to take and then a number. The number of the house that she would go to and ask for Rory Bennett, the person there would take her to him.

She walked slowly, looking around at everything she passed, but not too closely as she had learnt not to draw attention to herself. Still she tried to take everything in, sadly, she thought, that when she did she was just seeing ways of possible escape. When once she would have seen a heavily leaved tree as something beautiful, she now saw it as a good place to hide from pursuers.

It made her sad that she should think like this at just nineteen years of age but it was the reality if she wanted to stay alive. It was something she had trained herself to do, to be completely aware of her surroundings at all times, even when it seemed like she was focused on one thing she could be checking out everything else in the room also. She couldn't remember the last time she had walked into a room without finding all possible exits before settling and casting a safety check over everyone who was surrounding her. She couldn't remember the last time she had relaxed and let her mind rest if only for a second.

--

Twenty minutes after she had left the train station she arrived at the house with the number 26, the one written down on the paper. With her heart beating nervously she knocked on the door. A young woman opened the door to her and looked at her warily.

"I'm here to see Rory Bennett?" Hermione voiced her statement as more of a question as she was so nervous.

The woman still did not speak but stepped to one side so Hermione could enter the house. The woman led her into a living room and pointed her wand at the fireplace. Flames sprung up inside and she tossed in some Floo powder and they turned green. She didn't step inside, however, she just reached into it and when her arm emerged she was holding an old book. She handed the book to Hermione and walked to the door. She paused briefly and turned back to face the middle of the room where Hermione was holding the book with a puzzled expression.

"Good luck." She muttered and seconds later Hermione felt a tug at her navel and the world around her blurred as she was taken to a different destination.

--

As she landed her knees buckled and she crumpled to the floor. A few seconds later she sprung back up onto her feet and was looking around. She sensed she was not alone before she actually saw the man sat in the corner.

"You must be Hermione Granger; I was told you'd be coming today." He said as he stood up and walked over to her. He picked up the book and placed it into the empty slot on the bookcase. "I'm Rory Bennett. Now come with me."

As she had done with Margaret she put her trust in that man as he led her into the unknown. It could have been anywhere. It ended up being a room hidden behind a bookcase. There were three others in the room. An old woman, a young girl who looked to be about ten and a woman probably a few years older than herself, Hermione concluded.

The room was small and bare but it was warm and safe so she didn't mind very much. The other looked at her with brief interest before returning to whatever they had been doing previously.

"You will stay in here, it will be safe, my wife or I shall be the only ones to enter here; we will bring you food or fresh cloths if we can." He explained to her before walking from the room, leaving her alone with these strangers she had so much in common with.

--

Hermione was there for two days before she got to know the three women. The old woman, Peggy, had arrived just three days before Hermione; this was her fourth safe house since leaving her home in Cornwall, she was planning to go to Spain to stay with her sister. Then there was Susie, the ten year old; her parents had left her in the care of the Bennett's as they had gone back to their home to collect some items, Hermione didn't have any doubts that they would not return, but Susie would stay there until they came for her. The woman, Isabel, was twenty five and had been dating a pureblood before he was found out and killed, she had been captured but managed to escape. She was hoping to go all the way to America where her boyfriend's family was. She would stay with them for a while.

They all have real plans Hermione thought sadly, places to go, people to meet up with, lives to live. All Hermione had was the basic idea to leave the country, from there she had no clue as to what to do, where to go. It seemed that she would just take things one day at a time.

--

After two weeks she was getting restless. Peggy and Isabel had both moved on but there was still no sign of a place opening up for Hermione. There was still no news from Susie's parents; dead or alive.

In her time there she had learnt many things; the portkey she had taken had transported her just a streets distance away and the house she had travelled from was a pure-blooded family's, as was the Bennett's. But the house she had travelled from, the Dewitt family, the man of the house was a Deatheater and he had no idea that his wife was helping the people he tried to kill to freedom.

But life was like that now; everyone kept secrets from everyone.

--

By the middle of her third week Hermione was about to explode, or so she felt, she needed to get out, to get fresh air, to see something other than the four walls that she now felt trapped her. So one night she pulled on a thick, black robe and headed for the door. As silently as she could manage she navigated along the pitch black halls until she found the front door and was able to slip outside.

The cool air hit her face and she smiled as she breathed it in, the icy feeling filling her lungs. She began to walk, having no idea where she was going but needing to just move around.

She ended up in a small town, the shops all closed for the night although it was not deserted. She knew there was someone else around, she could sense them. It was not a Dementor, she could tell, as her mind was still sharp, still focused on the present not drifting off to her painful past, she was not slowing down feeling as though she had lost all momentum, she was still perfectly in tune.

Although she knew it was human, whoever was roaming the dark streets she could not tell if they were a Deatheater; were they were friend or foe? She eventually buried her curiosity and decided that she didn't want to find out.

Turning around she started on her way back to the Bennett house. This time she did not sense them as they started to swarm around the dark alleys. By the time she realised they were there she was already lost in the tears of her parents' murder. They started to surround her then as they fed of her painful thoughts. Without an amulet to repel them they were free to give her The Kiss, to suck away her sole and leave but a shell of a human behind.

--

It was no Deatheater roaming the streets. It was Draco, fuming after yet another row with his parents, which had resulted in his storming out of the house. He too, had not sensed the Dementors, it was only when his silvery protector leapt from his amulet and formed the shape of an eagle that flapped slowly beside him as he walked, did he see their dark hooded figures in the shadows.

It took his a further few minutes to realise that they were all headed in the very same direction. That could mean only one thing; he thought as he followed them, they've found a target.

Looking up at his Patronus he changed his path to follow the Dementors instead. They made slow progress alone the streets until they turned into an alley.

"What do they always run to the dead ends?" he wondered to himself.

He slipped between the figures until he reached the front of the crowd. A small group were huddled tightly around the person who was curled up in a small ball in the corner of the dark alley. Every couple of minutes there would be a burst of silver mist that was the feeble attempt at protection against the Dementors, but it barely even caused one to draw back so there was little chance of it actually saving her.

As the wind picked up the cloaks of the Dementors started to move out if the way and Draco was able to see the person who under threat. A girl, long brown hair covered most of her pale face but he could see the look of concentration on her face, which he knew was the attempt to hold a happy memory in her head.

The eagle had already started circling him as a way to ward off any attackers eager to get his soul. He quickly made his way through the gaps that were made from the Dementors backing away.

He was quickly able to get to her side and throw the long chain of his amulet around her neck as well. Draco pulled the girl into him and she collapsed against him, giving up the fight now that she knew that she wasn't going to be Kissed.

The eagle rushed forward and began circling the pair and the Dementors backed away slowly. Soon the alley was completely empty of them. Draco let out a sigh of relief and lent back against the wall. With the girl still connected to his neck by the chain he wasn't able to move, but he could take it off as he feared the Dementors may come back.

--

It was ten minutes before Hermione opened her eyes again. She looked up at the person who had saved her, a boy. He was wearing a robe over what looked like Muggle clothing. As he leant forward to remove the chain for both of their necks she saw the label and it was, sure enough a Muggle brand.

_He must be Muggle-born or at least Half-blood_ she thought, _no Pureblood would ever be allowed to wear those types of clothes. It was frowned upon for them to even wear the Wizard versions. Wait a minute! It can't be, that can't be right can it? _

"Malfoy?" She whispered in confusion.

"How do you know my name?" He jumped at the sound of her voice, not having realised that she was awake. He then became suspicious, how did this girl know him name? Was it a trap?

"I'm Hermione Granger." She told him as she pulled herself out of the chain.

"Granger?" He asked in wonder.

The girl stood in front of him looked nothing like the Hermione Granger he had known at school. The girl in front of him had short, layered hair falling to about chin length, her face was thinner and she was taller than she had been, her body was a completely different shape, the lack of food made her bones jut out and her completion pale.

"Why did you save me Malfoy, you of all people would want me dead?" Hermione asked, feeling all the anger she used to have for him built up inside of her. She reached into her pocket and gripped her wand tightly, awaiting attack.

"Not anymore Granger, I'm on your side now, look." He said and held out his arm where the mark of the deatheater should have been but his arm was still completely bare.

"You Malfoy? But you were supported Voldemort so strongly in school." Hermione accused.

"You're right," He admitted, "But that was before he was actually in power and I could see what he was doing first hand. My father used to bias the stories he told me to make them sound appealing but know I know the truth and I could never do that to another human being."

"How do I know that this isn't a trap and you're just here to kill me?" She asked although feeling less wary of her old enemy.

"If I wanted you dead why would I have saved you from the Dementors they could have taken your soul easily? Or why did I not just kill you while you were passes out, it would have been easy. But if you still don't believe me I'll show you."

He took his wand and threw it to the floor; he spread his arms wide and said. "If you still don't believe me do what you wish. Kill me or knock me out and escape, whatever you want."

Hermione stayed still, "No Malfoy I believe you, pick up your wand, you don't know who might be lurking about."

They spent the night sitting in the small space between the two buildings where Hermione had been so close to loosing her soul and spent the time learning what the other had been doing for the past two years.

Draco told her all about Cassandra and Hermione told him about loosing Harry. They were able to reach a common ground sharing in the pain they both felt for loosing a best friend. They had a new understanding that they could never have made in Hogwarts, they did not consider themselves friends straight away but in the weeks that followed they met up more and more and soon became each others replacement for the best friend they had sadly lost.

As Draco walked her home one evening she stopped before entering the safe house that he know knew all about. "Thank you for saving my life Draco." She said sweetly and hugged him quickly before running inside.


	4. Voldemort

**To Get Back Life **

A huge thank you goes to-

**Louiebugooey,  
****neostar,  
****Danish Pastry 28** – thank you for the support, you said that my summary made you sceptical is there any way in which you think I could improve it to attract more readers? I' love to hear your suggestions. Thanks.

* * *

_**Chapter 4  
**__**Voldemort**_

The day was upon them, House elves ran around the house frantically cleaning up and preparing for when the Dark Lord would be arriving. Draco remained in his room in his Muggle clothing. Since various arguments with his father he had gone into Muggle London and brought clothes from various Muggle shops. He loved the reaction he had gotten so he had continued to wear them. The robes that he was supposed to wear were lain out on his bed. A house elf had put them there a few hours before but he had made no move to put them on.

His cousin had arrived that morning with his wife, Clarissa, and their son, Adam. Luckily they were staying on the floor below so the only place he wouldn't be able to avoid them would be the staircases.

The door swung open and his mother walked in.

"Draco!" She barked, "Get out of those ridiculous clothes and get dressed!"

She picked up the robe and threw it at him with force. He caught it before it hit him and slipped it over his head wordlessly.

"The Great One shall be here soon and you shall join us for dinner and loose the attitude." She ordered. "I shall send a House elf for you when it is time."

--

An hour later the house elf appeared in his room and announced that he was wanted downstairs. Draco considered refusing to leave his room but he knew that the punishment for that would be something that he didn't want to experience. So begrudgingly he got to him feet and made his way downstairs to the Entrance Hall where the rest of his family was stood.

Thomas had his arm around Clarissa who was holding Adam in her arms. His parents were stood next to them, dressed in their best robes and stood up very straight waiting eagerly for their boss to arrive.

And soon enough he did. A green flame sprang up in the large ornate fireplace and Lord Voldemort stepped out. Everyone save for Draco quickly stooped down into a bow. A few seconds later after a threatening glare from his mother he followed the example.

"We humbly welcome you into our home My Lord." Lucius gushed.

"Yes, yes, get up." Voldemort snapped as he walked towards them from the fireplace.

They all straightened up and looked at the figure that they followed. He was tall, thin and very pale. The contrast of his black clothes was amazing against his icy white skin. It made him look surreal and very terrifying.

"If you would join us in the Dinning Room we can begin out meal My Lord." Draco's mother informed her and Voldemort nodded his head.

Once all seated, with The Dark Lord at the head of the table, pleasantries exchanged and the first course served they got onto new plans that Voldemort was making.

"So I've got a whole castle full of the horrible things and the fun of killing them is starting to get less so I've decided to make some money off them instead." He explained his new plans on what to do with the Muggle-borns. "I'm going to sell them to the Pureblood families as slaves."

"Oh how very smart!" Clarissa exclaimed excitedly. "We should get one Thomas! I could do with a new maid; the house elf we have at the moment is completely hopeless."

Everyone else agreed that it was a very good idea, everyone except Draco, at least, who stayed silent. He thought it was a horrible idea, as was everything that sprouted from the lips of the man that sat just three seats away from him.

"Well I thought as House elves are becoming such a bore." Voldemort explained as the main course was severed up and they began to tuck in, "What with them all getting the stupid idea about their rights and rubbish like that. They actually have the cheek to ask for sick leave! What is the world coming to? I ask you!"

Draco had to hold back a laugh at the look on his parents face, it was his old house elf, Dobby, whom had gotten the idea about being paid from someone and had got other house elves round to his way of thinking.

"I know exactly what you mean!" his mother was agreeing gushingly, "Our elves just are not up to par anymore. I don't know where these stupid ideas sprouted from but the person who started it deserves to be Arvada'd."

"Well Thomas dear tell me what have you been up to? You're working down in my ranks in Devon now aren't you?" The Dark Lord asked him.

Draco sighed as his cousin went into a long winded account of everything he had been doing. Giving great detail to one merciless killing of a family of Half-bloods he had found living in a half demolished house in one of the raided towns.

As he told what he had done to torture the children Draco excused himself and stepped out into the hall, waiting for a period of time he deemed long enough for them to have started talking about another topic of interest, before returning.

"So Draco what are you up to nowadays?" Voldemort inquired as he took his seat and looked down at the dessert that had been placed there while he had been outside.

"I'm still in school at the moment. I started the four year course when I finished Hogwarts; I'm in my second year at the moment."

"What is the course you're doing?" He asked him

"I'm training to be a doctor." Draco explained.

This was the truth, as soon as he had finished his seventh year at school he had started his course to be medically trained. It had brought him some time, everybody respected doctors and if he was training to be one they wouldn't ask him to do the Deatheater duties until he had finished his schooling.

"So we still have a few years until you'll come in to the fold then, I presume?" Voldemort asked.

"Oh yes, such a shame really," Draco's father interrupted "but he'll be much more useful as a medic than just another desk job."

While Lucius had been speaking Voldemort had been intently analysing Draco's face. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat under the gaze and looked down at the table.

"Oh yes so very useful." He said with a tight-lipped smirk, "or would be if you were ever considering actually joining us, isn't that right Draco?"

The table fell silent as all eyes turned to Draco's blushing face. He looked up at Voldemort's as he rose from his seat and walked over to his side of the table.

"Stand up." He commanded and Draco found himself unable to stop himself submitting to her tone.

"My dear boy, you don't want to be a Deatheater now do you?" He inquired menacingly.

Draco stayed still, not moving, hardly even breathing. He didn't have to answer the question; he already knew the answer anyway. He could see it in his face, the fear mixed with disgust when he looked at him.

He began circling him like a bird of prey would circle their victim from the air, making him feel more uncomfortable still.

"You're not going to become a medic and help us; you're not going to get your mark." He hissed before raising his volume considerably to yell "BECAUSE YOU'RE TOO SCARED!"

The whole family visibly flinched as he shouted, they could feel the anger in his tone and it was although it was bouncing around the room as a ball of hate.

"I am not scared." He replied through gritted teeth in a low hiss.

He balled up the front of his robes in his right hand. He had such a strong grip Draco couldn't move at all.

"You're going to be a problem, I can tell that you are going to cause your wonderful family such grief. You are going to dirty up the Wizarding name and I quite frankly can't stand for that." He hissed in his face venomously.

His parents watched with looks of fascination instead of concern, in fact the only one who looked slightly worried was Adam and that was only because his mother had stopped feeding him to watch the scene.

"You're just a Mudblood lover." Voldemort spat.

"Well you are one." Draco retorted, trying not to choke.

There was a collective gasp around the room and The Dark Lord quickly dropped him as thought he had been scorched. He looked shocked and hurt. He sniffed in a great gasp of oxygen and drew himself up to his full height.

"Your thoughts interest me." He told him, as though his remark had not been said, "They are very confused, you are torn between family ties and you own want. You flick between the two so quickly I can hardly read them at all."

Slowly he raised his hands, the index, middle and ring fingers rested of each hand on either side of his head, on his temples. He started to push slightly against his skull. It started to aches as his nails pierced the skin, but no blood came from it. Instead the area began to glow and his fingers sank inside Draco's head. They disappeared until the joint then he stopped.

Images had started flashing through her mind; these were Draco's thoughts and memories. Voldemort focused and the masses of swirling pictures slowed and he began to sort through them.

There were, first, the many arguments with his parents about the Dark Mark and becoming a Deatheater. All the anger and hatred that he felt, Voldemort now felt too.

Next came Cassandra; all the letters he had written or received. The summer they spent talking about things, the school friend he had stayed with. She now felt the warmth that he had felt when he had been with his only true friend; The Muggle-born.

Happy years at school, away from home, came next; the time with the people who didn't constantly argue with him and make him feel unloved, so he didn't have to worry about becoming a Deatheater or any of the other grief that Draco had to go through. But even then he had to live a lie, he was a Slytherin and all Slytherins must hate muggle borns right? He couldn't let that one slip with his father keeping such close tabs on the school.

Finally Voldemort came to the ones that interested him most; the ones with Hermione. The ones of her telling all about her life and more importantly about the safe houses. She watched the memory of Draco walking Hermione home. Watched her walk into the place that was keeping the Muggle borns safe.

Quite suddenly Voldemort removed his hands from his head and a wide grin spread across his face.

"Well it looks like you've been more useful then I could have ever imagined." he told him.

Draco, having seen what he saw, had a pained expression on his face.

_Not her too, _he pleaded in his head, he wasn't really sure who to, _don't take her from me too. _

"What is it My Lord? What has our poor excuse for a son shown you?" Draco's father asked, unable to keep the delight from his voice.

"He had shown me a safe house. One very close to here. The one that holds his Mudblood friend. He's just given me a few more slaves to sell. And a few followers to fry."

Without a further word he disapperated back to Riddle House. He needed to collect a team to raid the place. But he needed to give them instructions first. He wanted the girl alive; she would be a good means to torture Draco with.

--

Within the hour they were back, standing outside the house where Hermione was curled up inside sleeping soundly.

Not for long though as a loud bang startled her from her dreams and made her spring to her feet. She groped about in the pitch-blackness for her wand that should have been at her bedside but she had managed to knock it off onto the floor.

She was still crawling about helplessly when they burst into the room. One large man seized her around the waist and carried her in an awkward fireman's lift down the stairs.

Once outside she was hauled into a large cart along with all the other occupants of the house. Apart from the actual owners of the house; the Bennett family. They were stood outside on the pavement. The Dark Lord Voldemort was stood before them. He was pacing up and down looking at each one of them, taking them in. But this time the racket they had been making had drawn a crowd, neighbours had come out onto their lawns, still in nightclothes, to watch the goings on.

"This," he shouted to them "is what happens when you harbour Mudbloods in your home!"

With no warning he then turned his wand upon the family and killed them in a flash of bright, blinding, green light.

Before the last body had even had the chance to crumple to the floor Voldemort had disapperated, taking with her the cart that Hermione had been pushed into.

When they landed Hermione knew exactly where they were, she had spent nearly seven years or her life there and although it was now used for different purposes it still looked almost exactly the same. Hogwarts. When she knew it; a school, what she was going into; a prison.

Other things had changed too, she noticed as she stepped inside; very few of the candles were lit making the rooms seem dank and dreary. The castle now felt cold and unhappy, far from the warm, welcoming place that Hermione remembered. They were all pushed, roughly, into the first room they had gone into in at Hogwarts. The room they had all waited in before being sorted, and many people, Hermione noticed, had the same nervous and fearful expressions.

After a few painstakingly anxious moments the door was flung open and Lord Voldemort marched in. He had his wand in his right hand and he was idly twiddling it between his fingers. Twelve solidly built Deatheaters followed him into the room and surrounded the small group of Muggle borns.

"Line them up." Voldemort ordered and the men quickly pulled Hermione along with the others into some sort of orderly line.

They stood and watched him as he slowly made his way up the line and inspected each of the people. He pulled four people out of the line of the original seven; these four were dragged from the room; leaving Hermione and the other two left to face Voldemort's evil smirk.

"Where are you taking them?" One had the nerve to ask.

"Don't you worry about them now!" He cackled happily, "You'll never have to see them again. But you lucky few, I have great plans for you!"

He turned and walked out the door and the other Deatheaters left grabbed Hermione and the other two left and dragged them after her. They were taken to the Great Hall, and to the most shocking sight Hermione had ever seen.


	5. The Farm

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thanks to –

Curlyqntx,  
Mysteriouscharm,  
Londonmalfoy,  
Rachel,  
Swtndreamypnay,  
Kristen,  
Louiebugooey, - _your idea was really good but I can't use it, sorry, the Weasleys wouldn't support Voldemort so it would be unlikely that they would buy a slave. But thank you so much for your input it was much appreciated.  
_epiphany-the-storyteller,  
Danish Pastry 28 – _thank you for your ideas for summaries, as you may have seen I have used one of them and it really does sound better now. Thank you also for your comments about the title some of them sounded good but I'm still toying with the idea of whether to change it or not, I did like some of your suggestions though. _

**A/N – **well after that many reviews how can I not continue? I would just like to thank Danish Pastry 28 for so much input and would like to ask you all something about a point raised.

What do you think of the title to this story? Do you think I should change it? And if so have you got any ideas?

* * *

_**Chapter 5  
**__**The Farm**_

_They were taken to the Great Hall, and to the most shocking sight Hermione had ever seen. _

The whole floor was covered in pens. Small white fences caged off, what seemed like, hundreds of people to Hermione, but she guessed that it was just her mind exaggerating. The people inside where what shocked her; each one of them tied up with fraying rope twisted painfully around both of their wrists.

"Welcome to the Farm!" Voldemort exclaimed gleefully, delighted in the many people's suffering.

He walked down the gap between the pens until they got to, what used to be, where the teachers sat; now there was a large cast-iron tub filled with soapy water, a chest of robes and a branding iron. Voldemort turned to the Deatheaters who were held onto the group of Muggle borns that Hermione was in. "Get them prepared. We open tomorrow so I want everything in here in full working order."

The Deatheaters walked past him, dragging their prisoner behind them. When Hermione was being pulled past Voldemort held up his hand to stop them.

"Once she's ready put here in the back room I'm saving her for someone." He instructed and the Deatheater nodded eagerly before starting to pull her behind him again.

Once up on the platform Hermione was stripped of her clothes, dignity going with it, and shoved roughly into the tub of water, she was scrubbed until she was pink and covered in soap until her eyes were red raw. Once they deemed her clean she was dragged out of the water and hit with the freezing cold air of the Hall. Towelling her dry and cramming a thin black robe over her head she was then sat on a stool for a Deatheater to sort out the tangled mass of knots that was her hair. Deeming it all untangled the Deatheater pointed their wand at her head and her hair was instantly dried. She was then pushed into a queue of Muggle borns, when she reached the end of the line she realised why everyone look positively terrified.

A Deatheater grabbed her left hand and before she even had the chance to struggle pressed a hot metal rod against it. There was the hissing as the scorching hot metal met her cool skin, she screamed out in pain as the skin was burnt. Her skin was already blistering around the number now scarred onto her palm, tears pricked in the corners of her eyes but she held them back as she was led out of the room into the small room where Hermione remembered seeing Harry and the other people who entered the Triwizard Tournament go into.

It was a very small room and was now stripped of all furniture and portraits. It felt bare and cold, much like the rest of the castle did now, Hermione thought. The door was slammed shut and the locked with a firm _click. _Looking around her tiny room she walked to the corner and curled up, tucking her knees up against her chest. Now that she was alone she let the fresh wave of tears roll down her hot cheeks. She looked at her hand and winced at the sight of it, it looked awful. She gave a very loud sniff and looked around for something that she could use. Finally she found just the thing she needed; the curtains. She got to her feet and ripped the bottom of the clean white material, she wrapped the strip of cotton around her left palm. As it pressed against the blisters the pain intensified, she sucked in her lips and squeezed her eyes shut to stop herself screaming.

--

The next morning a loud bang scared Hermione out of her dreams and she quickly scrambled into an upright position as a Deatheater stormed into the room. They shoved a bowl of horribly greyish lumpy-looking porridge into her hands and stalked out of the room without saying a word.

With a sigh Hermione took the spoon and started to shovel it into her mouth.

"It might taste horrible." She told herself out loud, trying to justify why she was eating it "but who knows when my next meal will be."

The bowl empty, Hermione got up and paced the room thinking of something she could do, anything at all. When no thoughts came to her she pressed her head firmly against the floor to see through the thin crack of space between the door and the stone floor. After a few minutes she sat up and gave a frustrated growl; she could see nothing but the feet of many Muggle borns and Deatheaters. Feet were no help to her, feet couldn't tell her anything at all.

--

Draco was pacing his room with growing agitation; where was she now? What was going on? Was she now, in fact, lying stone dead because of him? He picked up the closest object to him, which just happened to be a very expensive china mug that his father prized, and flung it violently against the opposite wall. It smashed loudly into many pieces and for the slightest moment he felt a little better. But then more worries crowded his mind and he was back to pacing the floor.

He had, of course, wanted to go over to the safe house as soon as Voldemort had disapperated, but his father had dragged him by the wrists and flung him into his bedroom. Triple locking the door behind him, then, just for good measure charming the windows so he could climb out of them. But even in the height of his rage Draco could see this was a stupid idea, he was on the fourth floor, if he had jumped out of it he would be splattered on the concrete below. And just how good would he to anyone if he was dead?

Suddenly he came to a dead stop in the middle of the room, one foot still slightly raised ready for the next step that would never come, as realisation took a hold of him. What good would pacing and fuming really do? How would that help when anything he did he would be killed for? This was The Dark Lord he was up against, Harry Potter; the Boy Who Lived had died in his hands. How would he, an average nineteen-year-old wizard really compare? Not too well was his guess.

_So there we have it, _he thought furiously, _giving up again, as usual, aren't you Draco? I always give in; couldn't possible handle a fight now could I? Just shut your mouth and follow orders as ever, just forget about this girl that you so obviously had feelings for and now whatever happened to her is actually all your fault! _

He lay down on his bed feeling thoroughly sorry for himself and carrying on his line of self hating thoughts for quite a while. So long, in fact, he didn't realise that he had at some point fallen asleep; so when he next opened his eyes it was a bit of a shock to see the candles distinguished and light pouring through the open blinds.

He changed out of his stale, creased, slept-in clothes into a fresh t-shirt and jeans, Muggle branded, with a robe over the top, before trying the door again; still locked.

It was hours until it was opened and his mother walked in.

"Put on some shoes, we're going out." She ordered and flung a pair at him, watching like a hawk as he pulled them onto his feet and laced them up.

Once he was done he stood up and followed her out of the room, to the library. The fire in the huge fireplace was already glowing green and Thomas, Clarissa and Adam were stepping inside. It was large enough to fit four people in at once, although it was usually so hard to get out of the other end that they rarely travelled as a family anymore. They had already disappeared before Draco had time to focus on the location that they had said.

He was quickly ushered next into the flame with his Mother and Father along side him.

"Hogwarts!" His father declared in his demanding, loud voice and they were zooming off through the Floo network.

They soon came to a halt and stepped out into a large room that was filled with fireplaces that had various witches and wizards stepping out of.

"What are we doing here?" Draco enquired feeling very bewildered.

His Mother shushed him as he followed her down a large, high ceiling-ed hallway. They stopped outside a grand looking doorway which was promptly opened for them by two Deatheaters. Draco decided that they must have been far below the ranks of his father as they were not even acknowledged by him. But this thought didn't last long as it was pushed out by the horror that befell him as soon as he set eyes on the Farm.

He looked to his Mother and Father; who were gazing around the scene as if it were of usual occurrence, next to his cousin and his wife who also both look equally under-whelmed by the whole thing. Dracp simply shook his head in horrified wonder and followed his parents to have a closer look at the goings on, almost like a morbid curiosity.

It took him a little while of eavesdropping on various conversations to finally work out exactly what was going on. This was the Muggle born sale that Lord Voldemort had been talking about at the dinner party. All the poor, tied up people before him were to become slaves. It sickened him to think about it, so much so that he hastily made excuses and slipped outside to breathe in the fresh air and calm himself down.

--

"-such good prices, a really good deal. I've got four already; that's one to clean, one to make beds, one to wash and one to answer the door!" Draco overheard one Pure-blooded woman tell her friend.

"-only young ones mind," he heard another say, "all the oldies are locked up in the dungeons ready for the chop."

With these words Draco had to suppress a shudder, how could they talk so calmly about things so brutal? How could they seem so happy about so many people's deaths? It was horrific in Draco's eyes.

--

"Mr and Mrs Malfoy, just the people I wanted to see!" Voldemort exclaimed as he crossed the room towards Draco's parents. "I have something in the back for you; I saved her especially for you. Follow me."

They quickly followed their leader into the small room where Hermione was being kept. When they saw inside they were hugely disappointed to see that it was just one girl; or they were at least until Voldemort explained who she was.

"This is the one that your boy was friends with. I'm giving her to you as a thank you for getting me another house to raid. This is Granger, Potter's friend."

Draco's father twisted into a happy smirk as he realised that the girl stood before him could be the perfect torture weapon to use against his son.

"Thank you My Lord." He said quickly and made a low bow to her.

He handed him the rope that was tied around Hermione's wrists and walked from the room without another word. They dragged Hermione behind them as they left the room and went back to the departure room.

"Draco come on we're leaving!" His mother barked as they sailed past, by the time he had turned to face them they were no where to be seen.

By the time he got back to the room with all the large fireplaces they had already gone and his cousin and his family were leaving too. With a huge sigh he stepped into flames alone and declared where he wanted to go.

The library was empty when he stepped out of the fireplace into it, as was the hallway and the living room. He was just about to start up the stairs to his bedroom when his mother shouted him.

"Draco! Kitchen now!" she ordered and, grudgingly, he walked towards her voice.

His whole family was sat at the table, apart from Adam who was sat on the floor playing with his toy broomstick.

"Draco we would like you to meet our new maid; Hermione Granger." His mother told him and dragged Hermione back into the room. "You can thank him for getting you this job Granger; it was Draco who told the Dark Lord where you were."

Silence filled the room as the two teenagers regarded each other in horror. From the looks on the rest of his family's face Draco knew that they knew exactly who she was.

"Draco?" Hermione breathed tears filling her eyes.

"H-Hermione!" He stuttered in shock.

"Girl, you shall be sleeping in the attic with the house elves. You shall get up each morning at five and clean each fireplace. You shall then serve us breakfast at seven o'clock. At eight we got to work, you shall then make the beds and clean each room. Wash the clothes when you have finished that, there is a large washing tub outside. You shall then serve us dinner at seven thirty. Once you have done the dishes from our meal and made sure that everything is clean you may go to bed." Mrs Malfoy explained quickly, in a tone that implied that she would not repeat herself so it was very important to listen carefully. "Now, there shall be a bell, if you hear it you must come to the drawing room immediately as there will be a task for you to do. Do you understand?"

Hermione nodded quickly, finding she was quite unable to talk.

"You may go now; your duties will start tomorrow."

Again Hermione nodded and quickly fled from the room. She started up the five flights of stairs that would take her up into the attic.

_That's four floors to tidy each day. _She thought glumly as she climbed.

_How can he have told Voldemort? He was lying to me the whole time, making me believe I could trust him. _Sad thoughts spun in her mind as she lay down on what she guessed passed as beds for the house elves. _He was just trying to get information from me. All he wanted to know was where the safe house was and I trusted him, it's my fault that the Bennett family is now dead. _

With these depressing notions, for the second night running she cried herself to sleep.

--

The next floor down Draco wasn't feeling much better. He too was wracked with guilt. He too felt that it was his entire fault that Hermione was here and that the family that had been looking after her had been murdered.

_She'll hate me, _he sighed, _and she'll think I lied, that all I wanted was to leak information from her. This is all Voldemort's fault! If she hadn't interfered Hermione would have probably moved on by now and everything would be great. _

--

"Well this should teach him that he shouldn't befriend Mudbloods." Lucius Malfoy said happily to his wife as he poured out two glasses of Butterbeer for them.

"It will also make him despise us more." She responded sadly.

"Well if he wasn't such a bloody disappointment then we would have to be so damned hard on him and he would be like this at all!" Draco's father spat, slamming his hand against the table in anger.

"I know dear, I know." She soothed him, as she always did when he began to get worked up, which was usually quite often.

"What will we do about him getting the mark?" She asked a little while later, "You know as well as I do that he's going to refuse."

"I'm giving him six months, if he doesn't get it by then I shall get the Dark Lord to come and brand him himself," He informed his wife with a decisive smile, "Whether he likes it or not."


	6. Working

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you so much to –

Londonmalfoy,  
Louiebugooey,  
Countrybutterfly,  
XadraineMalfoy – _oops! Thanks for telling me, this was a story I wrote ages ago as a sequel to The Dark Lady where Hermione is evil, I guess I must have missed some when I was changing the first few chapters I wrote in that plot.  
_epiphany-the-storyteller,  
mysteriouscharm,  
Danish Pastry 28,  
Swtndreamypnay

* * *

_**Chapter 6  
**__**Working **_

A small hand shook her from her dreams at dawn the next day and Hermione jumped when she saw the face of a House Elf peering down at her from close range.

"It is being time to get to work Miss Hermione." It squeaked when she got up.

"Err, thanks, um?" Hermione trailed off, not knowing the Elf's name.

"Blinky, Miss." The Elf supplied.

"Yeah, thanks Blinky." She muttered as she got up and looked out of the small loft window.

The sun had hardly risen at all, _this is not natural _she thought _I should _not _be getting up this early, ever! _

Groaning she pulled her robes over her head and quickly stumbled into the tiny box of a bathroom that all the servants used. The Malfoy family had bought another Muggleborn to work around the house, a young boy whom Hermione didn't know the name of yet, but he was only the butler and was allowed another hour and a half of sleep before he was forced to start working.

She silently padded down to the ground floor and into the parlour where there was a box of equipment to use when cleaning the fireplaces. She was not allowed a wand so she had to do everything by hand, the Muggle way. This, of course, took a great deal of time longer than it would have done if she could have been magically aided.

As soon as she had done scrubbing the metal with a hard bristled brush and applied the polish with a soft rag a House Elf would appear and stock up the wood to light the first fire of the day. This happened with all twenty of the fireplaces. It was just coming up to seven o'clock when she got down to the kitchen, she sat down on one of the chairs while the House Elves placed all the breakfast food upon silver trays.

As the clock chimed seven thirty Hermione carefully carried the first tray into the large dinning room where the whole family were sat. She passed out the bowls, plates and cutlery to each of them, making sure to not look at Draco as she did so. She then quickly carried in the large bowls of cereal, plates of toast, bacon, sausages, eggs and kippers. Only when she carried in the very large jug of freshly squeeze orange juice did she stumble slightly, a little of the liquid tipped over her hand and Draco's mother 'tutted' loudly and Hermione wiped it off.

--

An hour later Hermione was allowed back into the Dinning Room to clear away the plates while Mr and Mrs Malfoy got ready for work and Thomas, Clarissa and Adam got ready to go back to their own home. Hermione had no idea what Draco would be doing; she knew that he was doing a college course in Medicine, but she was almost certain that he got his course material sent to his house. That meant that he would probably be somewhere in the house while she was working.

_Great! Just great! _She thought sourly _because that won't be awkward at all now will it? _

But she had little time to dwell on such thoughts, there was a lot to be done and the consequences of her not doing it had been explained _extremely _explicitly. She shuddered as she remembered Mrs Malfoy's tone and quickly picked up the bucket full of cleaning products.

She started on the ground floor and worked her way up. It took her around three hours to clean the first two floors to that she hoped was an acceptable standard. The third and fourth floors, however, took quite a lot longer. The first two floors were mainly sitting rooms, dinning rooms, libraries and studies. These were kept fairly clean and just needed dusting, and windows cleaning. The floors had been polished the day before and would need doing that morning so Hermione had quite an easy job. But the last two floors were in a horrible state; these were the bedrooms and bathrooms mainly. These had been used every day when the family got ready to go to work.

The third story was home to one of the largest rooms; the master bedroom, belonging to Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy. It was a terrible mess that Hermione was sure they had made on purpose to heighten her work load. There were clothes all over the floor, large mugs with, now cold, coffee at the bottom of it. The bed had been completely stripped and the mattress was half way off the frame. There were makeup stains all over the mirror and fingerprints smudged across the windows. With a heavy sigh rose set down her bucket and started to place the clothes back on their hangers. Trying to avoid the door that led to the en suit bathroom that she knew would be just as bad.

Three quarters of an hour later she emerged from a gleaming room happy with herself that she had accomplished such a task. She then opened the door to the guest bedroom that had housed Thomas and Clarissa. It was also in a bad way, with baby food drying into the carpet.

It was half past one before Hermione started on the forth and last, save for the attic, floor of the house. This one wasn't so bad. There was the large Astronomy room, with the glass ceiling that she deemed clean enough not to have to clean. There was another very small study that just needed a quick once over with a duster and then there was the last bedroom. The one that she did not know belonged to Draco.

"Oh." She exclaimed with relief as she opened the door. "Well this isn't too bad at all!"

She opened the window to let in some fresh air and to listen to the birdsong while she worked. After straightening out the bed and retrieving the pillows that were on the other side of the room she hung up the few clothes that were on the floor. She was in the adjoining bathroom when he walked in. He looked around and felt an instant twinge of guilt.

_She's been in here; _he thought sadly, _my friend has come in and cleaned up my mess. _

It startled him so much when she walked through the door back into the room that he actually made a grab for his wand.

"Hermione!" He gasped when his brained registered that the figure before him was not a threat.

She had the look of a trapped animal about her and it pained him to see that she actually backed up a few steps upon seeing him.

But once the wave of panic had washed over Hermione it was replaced with anger and betrayal. She wordlessly picked up her bucket and the few plates that had been scattered around and walked put of the room. She managed to get to the stairs before he caught up with her and grabbed hold of her arm.

"Hermione. Please! Talk to me!" he pleaded.

He forced her round so she was facing him but she still refused to look him in the eye.

"I'm sorry Sir but I have your washing to do." She whispered and quickly ran down the stairs.

Her words shook Draco; he stood completely speechless for a good few seconds before realising that if he followed her now he wouldn't make anything better. He needed to plan out what he would say to her, it needed to be good if she was going to be convinced. He made his way to the Library and threw a handful of Floo powder into the flames.

_I'll talk to her soon, _he decided, _but now there's something that I need to do. _

"Gringotts Bank!" He commanded.

--

Hermione wiped away the tears as she stood over the sink where she was washing the dishes. The meal that the House elves had prepared for Draco for his lunch was still sat on the table. It was a chicken and mayonnaise sandwich with the softest looking bread that she had even seen. It looked delicious with a salad sat at the side of it.

Her stomach growled at the thought of food, remembering that she hadn't eaten since she had been at Hogwarts the day before. She shook her head quickly and turned her back on the food, returning to her task. But again her stomach gave a cry of protest and sent her a shooting pain to go along with it.

"You can have that if you want." Came a voice from behind her.

She jumped and spun around to see who it was; Draco, of course. He had just returned from Diagon Alley and had been looking for her.

"What?" She asked looking confused.

"The sandwich, you can have it." He explained pointing to it.

"No, I'm not hungry." She said shortly but her stomach contradicted her giving a loud rumble. With a sigh she sat down and tucked in quickly.

The whole time Draco stayed in the doorway and watched her, but Hermione said nothing else to him. As soon as she had finished she carried the plate to the sink and continued washing up.

"Hermione I'm sorry I had no idea that any if this would happen." Draco pleaded to her back.

"Why did you do it?" She asked quietly after a long period of silence, she still didn't turn to face him.

"I didn't, I honestly didn't. I know it may look bad but it's not how you think. I never told Voldemort anything, he read my thoughts. I wanted you to be my friend, I honestly did." He explained hopelessly.

"And lying to me will really make you trust me?" She snapped.

"I'm not!" he insisted, ears turning pink with frustration, "I didn't know that he could read minds."

"So you're going to continue lying to me?" She shrieked getting very angered.

"No! I'm not lying to you!" Draco said again.

"Oh yeah? So it's just coincidence that you found out where the safe house was and then the Bennett family killed and me and the others slaves?" She muttered sarcastically.

"I didn't rat you out!" He cried. "It was Voldemort! I swear to you that it was."

Even as he said it out loud he knew how corny it sounded. He knew that Hermione wouldn't believe him and that she would probably become even angrier with him. And he was right; she slowly rose from her seat and returned to the skin.

"If you excuse me _Sir _I have work you're keeping me from, I don't think that the master of the house would be happy if he knew you were stopping the _servants_ doing their tasks." She said in an icy voice.

Knowing when to admit defeat Draco got to his feet and walked from the room. _Might need a little more planning next time, _he told himself furiously.

--

Thankfully it was only ten o'clock by the time the family had finished eating and Hermione had done the dishes. She collapsed wearily onto her bed and fell instantly into a deep sleep. The next morning it was the same process of being woken up and not being able to stop working until eleven in the evening. She was only ever allowed one meal a day if she had time to fit it in between her work load. But her body started adapting to this and the only thing that changed was the fact that her jeans were now too big for her and had to be kept up by a belt.

She avoided Draco as best she could as it was too painful to see him, he had ratted her out to The Dark Lord, he had let her believe that he was her friend and now she felt completely stupid.

The whole week he had been trying to talk to her, using the time that they had alone in the house to try to make things up. But whenever he managed to find her she was able to slip away before he got to vocalise his true thoughts and feelings and most days she heard him coming and hid before he could even be in the same room as her.

Draco's father decided that his new favourite time of day was the family evening meal; the tension was so great that he could almost see it rippling through the air. Draco refused to talk to him or Narcissa and would go bright red as soon as Hermione carried in the food and served it up for him.

"Girl!" He barked at her one evening as she turned to leave, "I want you to clean all the floors tomorrow. And make sure to put a wax coating on the floorboards in Draco's bedroom."

He face broke into a huge grin as he saw the look on his son's face at his words, he became even redder if it was possible and he sunk down into his chair, wishing that the ground would swallow him up.

"Yes Sir, certainly Sir." Hermione nodded quickly and rushed from the room.

--

At noon the next day there was a knock at the door and the butler, Mathew, quickly opened it. A young lady was stood on the porch dressed in pale pink robes and stiletto heels in the same colour.

"I'm here to see Draco." She said in a bored tone, twiddling a stand of her shiny blonde hair around her finger.

"Certainly Madame, if you would like to step inside I shall get Master Malfoy for you. And your name is?"

"Courtney Banks." She drawled as she stepped through the threshold and looked around the hall she was stood in.

"I shall alert him of your presence immediately Miss." Mathew said and walked away to find Draco.

A few minutes later Draco walked down into the Entrance Hall and Courtney leapt to her feet.

"Draco," She exclaimed happily, "It's so good to see you!"

"What are you doing here Courtney?" He asked holding back a sigh.

"Well when I came back from school and Daddy told me you were doing his course in medicine I had to come and see you! It's been almost two years since I last saw you, I thought I could come and catch up."

As much as he wanted to pushed her back out the door and lock it many times to keep her out, he didn't. This was the daughter of his professor, the one that would mark the term paper that he had been working so hard on. If he was impolite to her then it would leak back to her father and he knew that his behaviour would be reflected in his finale grades.

"How nice, it's really great to see you." He said with false cheer. "How about we go into the sitting room?"

"Certainly, lead the way." She said with an even broader smile.

They walked along the hall and Draco opened one of the doors for her to walk through. She stopped at the threshold and her nose curled up in disgust. He looked round her to see what had caused her to stop.

"Oh Hermione!" He exclaimed when he saw her. She was on her hands on knees scrubbing the floors with a hand brush.

"We'd like you to leave now _maid_." Courtney sneered at Hermione, talking slowly as though she thought Hermione was stupid.

"No Courtney we can go to another room, come on." Draco said quickly turning to leave.

"Oh come on Draco don't be stupid. She's the one who isn't important she can go." She said harshly.

Hermione collected up her things and turned to walk away.

"Oh and while you're up you can bring us some pumpkin juice." Courtney instructed.

Hermione looked to Draco, waiting for him to say something, but he simply blushed and looked down at the floor. With a sinking heart Hermione walked from the room.


	7. Ron

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you thank you thank you –

Danish Pastry 28,  
Louiebugooey,  
Swtndreamypnay,  
Countrybuttlerfly,  
epiphany-the-storyteller,  
mysteriouscharm,  
londonmalfoy – _don't worry there will be no more cleaning! Promise. I guess I pressed on the fact I wanted you all to feel sorry for her a little too much.

* * *

_

_**Chapter 7  
**__**Ron **_

"Baker, get your ass down here!" A voice barked from down the stairs. Ron sighed and got up from where he was sat. It was almost two years since he had left his home and disguised himself. He now lived in Scotland, working in the safe house closest to the Portal that took Muggleborns to France. His heavy amulet banged against his chest as he bounded down the stairs and into the pub that occupied the bottom floor of the large house.

"You called Rose?" He asked the woman behind the bar kindly; he was now used to her tempers and could ignore them completely.

Rose had lost her husband in a fight that had broken out between some Deatheaters in the bar just a week before Ron had arrived. She was in an awful state when Ron first started and he found he had to almost run the pub single-handedly for quite a few months. But she had pulled herself together and opened her attic as a safe house which was now running quite smoothly offering protection to both male and females.

He sometimes missed his old life, his family, his friends, Hermione whom he had loved with all his soul, but he knew that he had done the right thing in getting away from it all. The bounty on his head was ridiculously large and added to the stress that had piled up with trying to deal with his best friend's death. He loathed Voldemort, of course, for killing almost everyone who he held dear, some of his family luckily not all, a few been able to make it across the sea and into safety, Harry with the death so many had witnessed, Dumbledore, his teachers and some classmates in the violent attack on the school and Hermione? Since changing his name to Russell Baker and moving he had hear no word about her. All he knew was that when he had left she had been on the run. But that meant nothing by now she could have been caught, tortured and killed quite easily.

"Shift the barrels in the basement for me." Rose instructed, "And you'll need to take the small one up into the attic for fermenting."

Ron nodded and climbed down the stairs that were behind the bar and grabbed the small barrel by the door. It was not full of liquid as everyone thought bit of food, the Muggleborns were up in the attic and this was how their food and other supplies were brought up to them. He enjoyed spending time with the Muggleborns, getting to know the new faces and telling them all news of what was going on downstairs. He often accompanied people to the portal to say goodbye.

He was not ready to go through the portal himself yet, as when he did he would ditch his disguise and go back to being Ronald Weasley, best friend to Harry Potter and Hermione Granger, there on 'The Last Night'. For now he was happy being plain Russell with no fame whatsoever.

--

He picked up the newspaper and read through the front page when he returned into the bar, it was fairly empty so he grabbed a bar stool and began to read the article properly.

_**Life Gets Better For Pures**_

_Reporter: Rita Skeeter_

_With the great Lord Voldemort's new plans to make Pureblood's lives even easier he receives great praise. The Dark Lord's new plans to sell Mudbloods as slaves to pure families are the answer to our House Elf problems. _

_Since the House Elf revolt of three years ago against the old government the work of the elves has never been able to reach par. They wanted freedom and even our Great One has found it a struggle to control them when they gather in large groups to combine their powers against us. _

_Powerful Deatheater leader Lucius Malfoy had this to say – _

_"Using Mudbloods as slaves is a great idea, we can put to use the last generation of the hopeless, embarrassment to our society. House elves have become too cocky but take the wand off a mudblood and they're defenceless, this means that we'll finally be able to put them in their place. Finally they're where they belong; dead or serving us." _

_With these strong words there have been much demand to obtain a slave or two, it is the new must have and no household should be without one. Not only did he have that to say Mr Malfoy also had a very special treat of being given a free slave for reasons that will not be disclosed. _

_But it does not stop there not only did he get this slave for absolutely nothing but we have just found out that it is none other than Hermione Granger, friend to Pathetic Potter and Runaway Ron. The girl was finally found in a safe house that was raided only the night before the Farm opened. _

_The house was run by a well known family; The Bennetts, all have been put to death on charges of helping Mudbloods and conspiring to help these foul creatures out of the country. _

_Will the slaves work or will it end up being just a flash in the pan before they get the same ideas as the House elves and start a protest? Watch this space for the latest news on the subject. _

Putting down the paper Ron sat completely still, unable to move or gather his thoughts in any way. So Hermione was still alive but now working for that bastard Malfoy. He was at a loss, could he help her and blow his cover possibly getting them both killed or should he leave her there where she had a roof over her head and wouldn't be killed for a little while at least? It was a complicated matter that would require a lot of thought.

--

Three week later Draco was getting more and more frustrated with the fact that Hermione still did not trust him and decided that he needed to do something about it. Something big, very big, something that she couldn't ignore or walk away from and he had just the idea!

With one last trip to Muggle London he brought a new duffle bag and female clothes to fill it, guessing Hermione's size. Once that was done he paid one last trip to Gringotts to take the last of the money from his parents account in one big chunk before returning home.

He did not go to find Hermione immediately; instead he went into his study area in the room next his bedroom which was hardly ever used. He took the small key from its hiding place and unlocked the top draw. Rooting around through all the letters from Cassandra he found what he was looking for. An amulet that he had stolen from a Deatheater a year before, it was not longer on a chain but he placed a length of string which he tied in a knot to make a sort of necklace before placing it in his back pocket.

Going into his room he packet some of his clothes into his own duffle bag along with some food and his Gringotts key before going in search of Hermione. He finally found her in the Dinning Room polishing the table, trying to get rid of all the wax that had been 'spilt' by his mother the night before when she had moved a candle.

"Hermione, can I talk to you?" He asked quietly as he entered the room.

She jumped, not expecting the voice, and turned around hardening her expression as she did so.

"What?" She snapped waiting for him to talk while going back to cleaning.

"Can we sit down or something?" He asked, watching her clean put him on edge.

"Unlike you I have a lot of work to do and will be punished if I don't do it so either talk now or piss off, I haven't got time to stop I'm already behind on it all." She sighed wearily pushing her hair from her eyes.

Draco reached into his pocket and pulled out the amulet, dangling it from the string in front of her face.

"What's that?" Hermione asked, stopping polishing as her attention was captured by the object.

"An amulet, just like mine, so when we escape you'll be safe too." He said happily.

"Escape? Yeh like you're going to help me do that!" She snorted.

"Really Hermione believe me." He grabbed her shoulders and turned her to face him so she could look into his eyes and see that he was being sincere.

"No." She said after a very long pause of gazing into each other's eyes.

"No?"

"No."

"Why? I have everything planned, my parents are visiting Thomas tonight so we can slip away I have some clothes for you and money. We can carry on through the safe houses until we get to Scotland. We can make it to France, both of us together!"

"How do I know this isn't some kind of trap?" She asked him suspiciously.

"Fine then." he sighed and took the amulet from his own neck and handed it to her putting on the one hanging from the string instead.

Hermione placed the amulet into the pocket of her baggy jeans and gave a ghost of a smile. "I'm not going to wear it." She said decisively.

"Why not?" Draco cried.

"Because that would undermine the fact I'm a Muggleborn, I am proud of that fact not matter what happens and I'm not going to pretend to be something I'm not."

Draco's face crumpled, he had not pictured the confrontation going this way at all. He would have to go that night no matter what, before his parents fond out that he had stolen all their money from the shared account. He wanted Hermione to go with him; he didn't believe he could make the trip alone. Especially as he was a pureblood, he wouldn't be welcomed into most of the safe houses, but not only that he enjoyed her company and he needed a friend with him.

"So you won't come?" Draco asked sadly.

"Ah, I didn't say that now did I." she replied with a grin.

Draco's face broke into a grin as the first barrier that had been wedged between crumbled and was demolished. She was still weary of him but at least she didn't think he was about to rat her out to Voldemort at the first possible instant.

"So when are we going?" She asked him when they had both stopped grinning like small children.

"Tonight, late though so none of the House elves or Matt sees us. If you come down to my room about half twelve we'll set off then." He said. "In fact I think all there is to do now is replenish our energy levels."

They both quickly made for the kitchen and pigged out on all that was in the cupboards, when they were satisfactorily full they went to bed. Hermione sleeping in one of the guest bedrooms on a soft feather mattress instead of the pile of sheets she usually slept on.

--

At midnight an alarm went off in the room where Hermione was lost in dreams. She quickly got up and washed before putting on some of the new clothes Draco had bought her and making her way as quickly as she could to Draco's room. She was full of apprehension about this plan. She wanted to get out of the house more than anything in the world and if she was with Draco she could do that as the magical binds that pinned her to the house only let her a certain distance from the Manor without a Malfoy family member without hurting her badly.

But could she really trust him? How did she know that he didn't really rat her out to Voldemort? As much as she did want to believe him there was still the niggling doubt at the back of her mind. _Did he really just save my life so he could help Voldemort uncover a safe house or is he telling the truth? _No matter how much she thought about it she could not decide.

In the end she decided that the worst that could happen would be that she was killed and most of the time she thought that that could be a blessing in disguise, anything to get her out of this hell hole that was her life.

--

Draco was pacing his room when Hermione knocked on his door. Could he really do it? As much as he hated his parents could he really make it on his own? He didn't care that he wouldn't finish his medicine course; he had never really wanted to become a doctor anyway. Once he was in France he could do something else anyway.

He pulled the door open, wincing as it creaked, and ushered her inside. They did not speak, but they knew exactly what the other was thinking as they were collecting together their things.

Very slowly they crept down the stairs until they reached the front door where they both stopped abruptly. This was it, once they crossed the threshold there would be no going back. They would be on the run, Draco for deserting his side and Hermione because she was Muggleborn, both crimes punishable by a very gruesome death.

--

Ron was down in the basement when they came. He heard their heavy footsteps and saw as the dust fell from the ceiling up above. He joined Rose up by the bar and waited as they went room to room searching. They did not find anything though. Ron had created a room much like the Room of Requirement but he had tied in the idea of the Mirror of Erised, only someone with kind intentions would ever be able to find the room.

The took a full hour searching through every room before they left but they didn't even find a hair, there was no way they could charge either Ron of Rose even though they could sense that there was something not quite right.

"That was so close Russ!" Rose exclaimed as the door banged shut. "I did not like that one little bit."

"Me either Ro, me either." He sighed and rested his head against the shiny wooden of surface of the bar.

His thoughts turned to Harry and Hermione. He didn't want that life anymore, this is where he wanted to be, he want to help people but not in a way where he would have to battle. No more fights, was his new resolution; that part of his life was over, he didn't want to go down that road again. He would stay at the pub, he would help Muggleborns escape and one day he would go too and he would be Ron Weasley, but a new Ron Weasley. A Ron Weasley who didn't loose everyone close to him.


	8. Covering Tracks

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you to –

Londonmalfoy,  
Draco's-Loyal-Longing,  
Louiebugooey,  
Mysteriouscharm,  
Danish Pastry 28,  
Swtndreamypnay,  
Countrybutterfly,  
Song of Rain

**A/N – **well all I can say about The Half-Blood Prince (don't worry I won't say what happened in case anyone hasn't finished it yet) is bloody hell! I did not see that coming! The sneaky bloody bastard! But it was great wasn't it? Let me know your views I want to hear other points of views too.

* * *

_**Chapter 8**_  
_**Covering Tracks**_

The first night was the easiest of the trip for Draco and Hermione as no one was yet looking for them; they quite happily rented a room in a run down little pub with no fuss whatsoever. It was after that when things became difficult.

As soon as Lucius and Narcissa woke the next morning and found the beds of both their son and their slave empty they knew what had happened. The law officials were alerted immediately, although much to the displeasure of the Malfoys' as they had to rat out their own son, a horrible blemish on the family name.

--

"So what are we going to do?" Hermione asked the one question Draco was trying to answer himself as they continued their journey the next morning.

"I'm not too sure." He sighed and carried on thinking up long and complicated schemes.

"What do you mean you don't know? You said you had it all planned out!" Hermione yelled the fear at the pit of her stomach rising.

"Hush! You're drawing attention to us." Draco quelled her quickly before adding "And I said nothing of the sort."

Hermione merely tutted, causing Draco to give a happy smirk before speaking again. "We'll need to change our appearance, can't use Polyjuice though, wouldn't be able to buy the ingredients without raising suspicions and it'd take way to long."

"We used Polyjuice against you once." Hermione told him happily, her mind turning back to happier times and a serene look crossing her face, much like the Luna Lovegood seemed to wear at all times.

"You what?" Draco asked, taken aback.

"In the second year near Christmas, we needed to see what you knew about the Chamber of Secrets." She told him with a smirk that could have rivalled one of his own.

"But we were twelve! Polyjuice potion isn't taught until N.E.W.Ts! How did you manage that?" He asked her incredulously.

"Well it wasn't that hard as long as we followed the textbook word for word."

"Never any risk you not doing that now Granger, but how'd you get the ingredients not like a shop would want to sell those sorts of ingredients to Hogwarts students."

"No I guess it would have roused some suspicion, I stole them from Snape's store cupboard." She told him unable to keep the gloating tone from her voice. "Stupid git." She added regarding the ex-potions master.

"You stole from Snape? Wow you're bloody braver than me!" Draco praised and a new respect for her was formed, Hermione smiled back at him relaxing slightly.

"We could use muggle disguises." Hermione said suddenly and it took Draco a while to form the link between this suggestion and the previous conversation. "They'll expect us to be using Polyjuice and be a completely different person, but it's amazing how a good wig and a pair of sunglasses can change you."

Instantly she then took control grabbing his wrist and leading him out of the magical streets and into Muggle London. He did not question her as to where they were going or if she was sure that her quickly thought out plan would actually work, he knew that she knew her way around muggle towns better than he and that by the way she spoke out it, it seemed she knew what she was talking about.

They soon arrived outside a small shop and Hermione confidently pushed the door open and walked inside, Draco followed although a little more nervous. He felt wary of places that he did not know.

--

Hands already filled with goods Hermione walked back over to him and instructed that he tried a few things on. He did so, self-consciously at first feeling embarrassed when she laughed but joining in when he saw how stupid he looked in the mirror. After various attempts they decided that black hair looked the best on him, or next best if he could have not have his blond hair he insisted. They decided that the shoulder length almost yellow blonde wig looked most realistic on Hermione and they went to buy their purchases.

"Hermione! We've no money for them." Draco realised as they queued behind a couple of schoolboys buying fake guns and cowboy hats.

"Don't worry about that, here hand me five Galleons." She instructed and he did so as she pulled out her wand he had been able to steal back of his parents before departing.

Discreetly she tapped all five of the coins with the tip of her wand, not needing to say the spell words out loud to make the spell work effectively, and with a brief shimmer the coins not sat on the palm of her hand were those of muggle currency.

"How'd you do that?" Draco asked her, not being able to keep the shock and admiration from his face.

"Something I made up, it's better than waiting for ages for them to change it at Gringotts." Hermione shrugged, but it was obvious that she was pleased with herself.

"But it's counterfeiting." He hissed so no one else would hear.

"No it isn't there's still the same value of money here it's just the appearance that's been changed. It's like in Transfiguration; you cannot create something new but change the appearance of what is already there, it's the same basis really."

He had no time to reply as Hermione stepped up to the counter to pay for the goods, explaining that they were for a play when the woman asked why the wigs were needed. He was glad that she was there, never would he have thought of using wigs, nor we he have been able to overcome the problem with the money and if the woman had asked him why he needed them he would have snapped at her. He then felt a quick stab of jealousy; he was the Slytherin it should be he who was the sneaky one.

"What next then?" Hermione asked as they left the shop, it seemed that Draco was in charge once more.

Draco thought silently for a while before speaking, "We need to get rid of anything that can be recognised as out own, watches, necklaces and the like. I'm sure my parents won't take long in finding out what I've taken with me. And I'm sure they recorded anything they let you keep when you were at the far- at Hogwarts." Draco blushed, not able to talk about what Hermione had been through without feeling immensely guilty.

"So we'll find a place to hide them?" Hermione asked wracking her brain as to a place where they could safely keep things without anyone finding them. Nothing came to mind apart from her Gringotts vault, but that was no good nether of them would be able to get to their vault without being caught.

"No, I think we should sell them. First off it will get us some extra money which is always good and secondly, think about it, if they're looking for these items and they see someone else with them on then the scents off us for a while and once they realise they're tailing the wrong person then we'll be long gone." Draco explained, talking slowly as though he was working it out for himself at the same time.

"Good thinking." Hermione grinned and they set off towards the pawnshop in order to get rid of the things that would identify them.

--

That night was spent sleeping rough on the streets of Muggle London. Hermione did not mind she was used to it from the time she had been on the run before the safe houses and before they farm and slavery. To Draco however it was a new experience and not one he would happily repeat if he could manage it.

When they woke they found a small diner and entered to use the bathrooms to get changed into some of the spare clothes they had shrunken to fit into their bags and to have a wash. Once they were both feeling significantly cleaner they sat down to drink luke-warm coffee and nibble on the crusts of toasted drowned in melted butter.

"When we get to France I want to find him." Hermione said decisively.

"Who?"

"Ron, he's not dead, if he were it would have been in the papers, he was Harry's best friend so it would go down well with the deatheaters and scare the remaining wouldn't it?"

"But don't you think he would have written to you if he was safe?" Draco asked, not wanting Hermione to get her hopes up, as he knew too well the feeling of disappointment.

Maybe he couldn't. Or maybe he thought he would uncover me if he did so he's waiting for me to contact him." Hermione thought out loud, "I should try writing to him again."

"Again?"

"Yes I used to write a lot when he first went missing but there was never any reply. The owl must not have been able to find him."

"Come on," Said Draco, draining the last dregs of coffee in his cup and standing up. "We need to get going." It was quite obvious that he did not want to peruse the matter and Hermione dropped it.

Soon enough they were back in Wizarding London, wigs on and Draco wearing a pair of thinly black-rimmed glasses.

"Look at that." Draco hissed out of the corner of his mouth and Hermione turned to look at where his eyes were signalling to. Upon the wall there were pinned two pieces of parchment on one there was a picture of Draco and Hermione's face was printed on the other, in big bold lettering one word screamed out at them: **WANTED. **

"Let's hope no one notices us then, I don't suppose that it will be a nice welcome." Hermione muttered back as they pressed on.

Although the circumstances were bad Hermione felt quite pleased; Draco was wanted too, that meant he had to be telling the truth about not ratting her out. If he had done so voluntarily then he would have been rewarded not arrested.

This happiness was only short lived as a coldness swept over like a wave, she looked around wanting to see where it was coming from and soon spotted the flowing robes of the Dementors drawing closer. Draco saw them too but could not do much about it, there were many purebloods around the street he couldn't simply throw his chain around her neck too and she had no time to find her own out of the bag. He was at a loss until a spark of inspiration flashed in his mind. Turning quickly towards her he pushed her against the wall and kissed her, surreptitiously sliding the chain over her head too. He did not stop kissing her until the Dementors had passed, when he believed it safe he slipped the chain off her again and pulled away.

"So you see it is not a matter of not being proud of your roots but a matter of survival." He said to her, as he continued to walk, regarding her argument for not wearing the amulet he had given her.

Hermione said nothing, but out of the corner of his eye he saw her pull the chain from her bag and place it in her pocket instead. He could see that her cheeks were flushed but whether it was from being scolded by him or kissed by him he did not know.

--

"Potter! Come out come out where ever you are!" Called an eerie, taunting voice called out through the dark room, only every third candle lined against the wall was lit in the Astronomy tower of Hogwarts casting the room in a dull glow.

Voldemort entered the room just in time to see a pale white glow vanish through the opposite wall. "Very well boy if you wish to be stubborn so be it, I was only coming to tell you it appears that we will be able to kill your friend after all, she's run off with the traitor Malfoy boy. Maybe she'll join you here when we catch her, she'll be so pleased to know you're still lurking around."

The tall thin man turned and walked away, slamming the door firmly at the bottom of the stairs. For a few seconds the room was still until through the wall a ghost appeared, a young man, tall and his hair messy. You could no longer see the raven black of his hair or the shocking emerald green of his eyes, but the glasses were still fixed firmly upon his nose and on his forehead there was a faint silver line in the shape of a lightning bolt. This was unmistakably Harry Potter.


	9. Getting Closer

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you to –

**Danish Pastry 28** – _I was thinking the exact same thing about R.A.B, it would make an interesting twist and I've never like Snape much either. It will be interesting to see what happens to Draco in the next book I don't think either side will like him very much.  
_**Kristen** (x2) – _thanks for sharing your views, hopefully there will be a bit more from Draco in the 7th book I want to know what happens with him too.  
_**Londonmalfoy** – _The whole character that Draco portrayed will open up a lot of new plot bunnies for writers until book 7 comes out, at least it wasn't him who killed Dumbledore (if he's dead)  
_**Countrybutterfly** – _the ghost thing will explained at some point, I promise but probably not for a few chapters. Regarding HBP I guess there are some clues looking back now but I didn't pick up on them so it came as a total shock to me.  
_Onigiri Momoko – _I know sorry, it was late when I wrote this and I've been feeling really depressed lately so I thought I should just churn one out quickly before you all loose interest. I'll try to be more careful in future.  
_**Hazelocean  
mysteriouscharm  
lightning8star  
Pip08

* * *

**

**_Chapter 9_**  
_**Getting Closer**_

Early the next morning Draco and Hermione woke, both remembering a dream they had had about the other and feeling embarrassed by it, they silently ate breakfast and set off to their next destination. They flew by broom from London to Harlow where they stopped for lunch. The sheer terror of flying made Hermione briefly forget all about Draco kissing her the day before and the dream she had had with him in so at the table she started a conversation.

"If you could do anything before you leave what would it be?" She asked before she took a bite out of the huge sandwich sat on a plate before her.

Draco was silent for a while as he thought of the answer, "I would tell my father where to stick it and I'd kill Voldemort for having Cassandra and her family killed." He said, but then thought about it and added, "Well maybe not if I was leaving, more like if I had immortality."

Hermione smiled and Draco stopped thinking, all he could do was stare at the woman opposite him. The urge to lean over and kiss her once more took over him and he did his best to overcome it by asking. "What about you? What would you do?"

"I'd find Ron and Ginny." Hermione said firmly, "Or at least find out if they're dead or not. I want to be able to get on with my life and I can't not knowing, if they're dead I'll be able to greave for them and if they're alive I'll be able to be happy that they too survived."

"I could help you know." Draco said thinking of everyone he had befriended who knew about or had connections with safe houses. "I could ask some people if he's been seen, get the word out you're looking for him. Maybe he thinks that you've given up, or maybe he's out looking for you too and just hasn't found you yet."

Hermione smiled at her new friend's consideration. "That would be nice of you, thank you."

Draco nodded thoughtfully, "I'll send an owl out tonight. You would happen to have a picture of him anywhere would you?"

After rooting around in her bag for a short while she finally found a picture she had been carrying with her and handed it to him.

"You should have gotten rid of this you know, it's something they could identify you from." He joked, pretending to scold her.

"Well it's lucky I didn't then isn't it, but what about Ginny?"

"If we find Ron he may be able to give us some ideas to where she is, she may even be with him, you never know but I'll ask about her in my letter too."

They decided as the day was very cloudy, perfect conditions to fly undercover, to continue flying until the evening. They made it all the way to Coventry before nightfall where they found an old half pulled down building to sleep the night in.

The next morning Draco woke early and sent a letter with an owl he found as he has promised Hermione to a woman he knew in Manchester whom could possibly help. He then packed up all the things in his bag and got out the brooms ready for more travelling when Hermione up. He sat on a pile of broken bricks and watched her sleep, curled up into a tight ball to keep her body warm.

Finally her eyelids fluttered open and she sat up, smiling as she saw Draco looking down to her. "Where to today?" She asked as she starched her arms above her head and yawned loudly.

"I think we should make it to Derby today, if the weather's cloudy again." He told her as he tossed her an apple out of his bag.

--

They made it to Derby by four that afternoon, it took a while, as it was quite windy so whenever the clouds were blown away they would have to stop and wait for the skies to cover again before they could continue. Once at their destination Hermione dragged him to another wig shop where they changed their look completely, Draco with shoulder length strawberry blond hair and Hermione with short spiky brown hair and a fake stud through her eyebrow.

"Remind me again why we have to do this?" Draco grumbled as he itched at the lining of the wig rubbing against his scalp.

"They are Purebloods, they think Muggleborns are inferior and Muggles are scum, they will not both to even think that Muggles would ever have any way of going in disguise. This means that they'll be expecting us to use magic so will be checking for those types of spells being cast to investigate. If we don't use magic it will make it harder for them to find us. And stop itching we're getting funny looks." She slapped his hand away from his head and glared at the woman who had been frowning at the sheer force that Draco was using t scratch under his hair.

When he reached his hand up to scratch again she grabbed it and held on to it so he could not be tempted to itch. After a little while of walking with hands cupped together, their fingers moved so they were instead laced and gripping the other's hand tightly.

--

It took them a further week to make it to Manchester and to Draco's friend's safe house due to the clear weather. There had been many close shaves where either Hermione or Draco or both had been recognised, but luckily they were able to get away or distract the person before they became sure of their identities.

"Draco!" Abigail exclaimed as she threw open the door "It's so good to see you! It's been far too long. Just look at you you're just skin and bones, we'll have to feed you up!"

Draco shushed his fired quickly as both he and Hermione hurried inside hoping no one had heard her. Hermione was shocked at how much Abigail was like Molly Weasley as she fussed over Draco, making comments on various things.

"Abby, this is my friends Hermione."

"Hermione Granger! What an honour to meet you my dear!" Abby shook Hermione's hand firmly, "I'm afraid Ron nor Ginny have been seen, I asked everyone I knew but no one knows where they have been." She said to the pair sadly. "But we can't give up, if they're out there we'll find them. Now come and eat, then you can have a nice sleep."

This comment sent Hermione right back to when she had been staying with Maddy. She wondered how she and Joe were and if he had been moved on yet. She hoped with all her heart that he had and that both of them were still safe.

--

Two weeks later they left Abby's safe house, it was the first cloudy day they had had, and set off flying for Leeds. The only reason Hermione would go near the broomstick was because she knew if they did the whole journey by foot it would take too long and they would be found by Deatheaters or Dementors and Draco had promised that if she fell he would catch her. Seeing as how Draco had saved her life twice already in the short time she had known him she trusted him to live up to his word.

Once in Leeds they had very descriptive directions to their next safe house. They found it with ease and a woman with long blonde hair tied back in a braid answered.

"You are the new arrivals I presume?" She asked and continued before either of them had even a chance to open their mouth. "Follow me."

Hermione and Draco had to jog to keep up with her quick pace of walking as she led them to a fireplace. "In there." She commanded and they didn't hesitate to follow instructions. With a wave of her wand the woman, who hadn't even bothered to give her name, caused the fireplace to spin one hundred and eighty degrees so they were on the other side of the wall.

They stepped out and almost immediately the fireplace spun back leaving the wall blank. The room they were now in was empty save for furniture and even that was a little sparse. Two mattresses were over by one wall with blankets thrown on top. There was a small table with two wooden chairs pulled up to it. Two empty pewter plates were atop the table with chipped china mugs and cutlery. Pushed far into the other corner was an old cast iron tub, one handle rusted and broken.

"Home sweet home eh?" Draco sighed and flopped down onto on of the mattresses. Hermione quietly sat down on one of the chairs. "What's wrong?" He asked her sensing her unease with the surroundings.

"Just not had too many good experiences with these places yet." Hermione whispered, eyes brimming with tears as she remembered the incident on the train and being captured by Voldemort and taken to the farm.

"Hey! Don't cry we're going to be fine." Draco said and stood up walking over to wrap his arms around her, she lent her head on his chest and he stood still. They stayed like that for a long time the only thing moving were the slowly falling tears down Hermione's cheeks.

When she finally stopped crying Draco took his arms from around her shoulders and lay back down on the mattress. This time Hermione two went to lie down on the one next to him. With a quick flick of his wand the lights went out and the room was cast into darkness. Both lay there thinking of the other, unable to sleep as their faces crowded each other's mind.

"Hermione?" Draco whispered breaking the silence.

"Yes?" She whispered softly back turning to face him, trying to make out his face in the dark.

"Can I tell you something and you'll promise you won't get angry?"

"OK."

"I think I like you." He admitted, glad it was dark, as he didn't want her to see him blushing. He waited for a few seconds but she made no response. "Are you mad?"

"How can I be mad when I think I like you too." She whispered back and he could tell that she was grinning.

With no further words they pushed back the blankets they had been covered with and Hermione climbed into Draco's bed. She snuggled into his chest and he wrapped his arms around her, pulling the blanket back over them both so they would stay warm. She then moved up a little further and tilted her head towards his, he smiled before he lent down and kissed her soft pink lips. As Hermione's hands ventured under his t-shirt he pulled back slightly and grinned. "I think we should get some sleep Hermione."

She nodded and with one last kiss she moved back down so she fitted comfortably into his arms.

--

After three days of never having to leave that small room they were told by the snobbish woman who had answered the door they had a place in a safe house in Harrogate. They were both sad a t the prospect of having to travel again as they were still getting to know each other but were glad that they were getting closer to Scotland.

"Why is it in Scotland anyway?" Hermione asked as they walked along, Draco's arm around her waist and his hand in the back pocket of her jeans. "Wouldn't it make more sense to have it somewhere like Dover, somewhere that's actually close to France?"

"Why? The magic works just as well at the other side of the country and t means that there's less chance of all the Muggles going to and from France finding us." Draco explained with a shrug.

"Yeah I guess so."

They walked on in silence for a while until Hermione stopped.

"What's wrong?" Draco asked, thinking she had seen a Deatheater or Dementor.

She said nothing but pointed across the huge field they were walking through.

"What?" Draco asked again following where her finger was pointing but seeing nothing more than an old half smashed bridge.

"Don't you recognise it?" Hermione asked excitedly and when Draco shook his head she exclaimed. "It's the Hogwarts Express rail track! Look around don't you recognise the surroundings?"

Draco did so and found himself shocked that he actually did. He found it strange to be looking at it all from a different angel, having only ever seen it from the train window before.

By the time he snapped out of his memories he found himself standing alone, Hermione quite a way away walking toward the remains of the bridge. He quickly ran to catch up with her.

"Where are you going?" He panted as he grabbed hold of her arm and pulled her into him to stop her from walking any further.

"If we follow it it'll take us to Hogsmade, that's got to be near to Scotland. Think about how long it took us to get from King's Cross to Hogsmade station, think about the cold weather. It all adds up!"

"But Hogsmade is near Hogwarts, that place will be swarming with Deatheaters and Dementors." Draco protested.

"Never mind we'll deal with that when we come to it, but for now we can get to Scotland quicker!"

With a sigh Draco admitted that Hermione's plan made sense, even if it was dangerous. They began to walk towards the path that had taken them to school, taught them magic and started all of the things they were in now.


	10. Lost and Found

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you to –

Onigiri Momoko – _Harry isn't alive, he's a ghost at the moment but Hermione will need to find him sorry if I didn't make that clear.  
_Londonmalfoy,  
Mysteriouscharm  
Countrybutterfly  
Danish Pastry 28 – _cheers for the spelling corrections, I've never really been one to consider spelling too much when I'm writing so it's always good to have someone to help me out.

* * *

_

**_Chapter 10_**  
_**Lost and Found**_

"We're lost!" Draco declared with a groan.

"No we're not don't be silly." Hermione gave his the best smile she could muster, but she had been thinking the exact same thing.

"Yes we are," he insisted, "look we've past that pile of rubble before."

Hermione followed his finger to the huge pile of broken bricks, stones and dust that he was pointing at. He was right it did look exactly the same to the one that they had passed just an hour earlier.

"Don't be silly, it's a pile of rubble how can you tell it apart from any other ones we pass." She argued, determined that they would find Hogsmeade Station.

Draco grumbled incoherently under his breath and Hermione let out an exasperated sigh before saying. "We just need to find the railway track again, that shouldn't be too hard."

But three hours later when they had gone the length and width of the field and still came up empty handed they admitted defeat.

"We'll have to sleep now, it's getting dark and we'll have a better chance of finding it in the morning." Draco decided.

They found a sheltered spot and set up camp for the night both hoping that the next day would bring them more luck in their search.

--

_Ron, _

_I hope this letter finds you in good health, hell I hope this letter finds you full stop to be perfectly honest. It's been at least a year and I haven't heard from you, you could be dead for all I know, but I honestly hope that you are not._

_I'm in Hogwarts, I was captured last week, I'm in a tiny cell in the dungeons at the moment and I'm scared. I don't know what they're going to do with me, but what ever it is I assure you it won't be good._

_Please help me brother, I beg of you._

_Your only sister, _

_Ginny. _

Upon finishing the letter Ginny instantly put her finger in her mouth to stop the blood flow, for many days she had searched every square inch of her cell hoping to find something she would be able to write with and on but had no luck. In the end she found the solution, her robes were white, or had been when she had first put tem on and her blood would be a good enough substitute for ink. What she didn't count on was the light-headedness after loosing so much blood. She would have to rest for a while.

Placing the material with her note on in the far corner of her cell she covered it with dirt, mainly to hide it but also to use as a way to soak up any of the excess blood that hadn't dried. Then she lent back against the wall and closed her eyes.

_Sleep will do me some good. _She decided, _after all I need all the energy I can get. _

Once awake Ginny felt a little better, although her finger still stung from where she had cit it on the metal of the door. She picked up the material and folded it into the shape of a bird like her mother had taught her to do with pieces of coloured paper when she was young. Holding it in her cupped hands she concentrated with all her might at channelling her magic into it, for a long time nothing happen and right when she was about to give up the material started to glow slightly. A few seconds passed and the wings of the bird began flapping and it lifted off of her palms.

"Find Ron." She whispered as she rushed to yank open the stiff window and watch as it flapped away.

Only when the note was out of sight did she realise that she had been holding in her breath, she quickly let out a sigh of relief and collapsed back against the wall completely exhausted. Wordless magic was one thing; wandless magic was much, much harder. With out the wand it was hard to direct spells but she had been working on it ever since she had been capture a month before. Hopefully she had done it and her brother would get the message and come to help her.

It was highly unlikely though, he could be thousands of miles away and her spell might fail. The note could be intercepted and destroyed before t could reach him. Or, worst of all, he might not be able to read the note because he had been killed.

--

Ron was sat in his bedroom; the night was warm so he had opened his window to stop the air in the room being so stuffy. He happened to glance out of he window and something in the distance caught his eye, a small white object zooming towards him. It wasn't an owl, it was too small and it didn't have the correct shape to be a bird. As it got closer he could finally make out what it was. It was an origami bird, but somehow it was flying on is own. It slowed as it approached the window finally coming to rest on the sill where Ron quickly snatched it up, he noticed that there was some sort of writing on it and unfolded it. Once he had finished reading it he threw on some clothes with his cloak over the top and hurried down the stairs.

"Rose?" He called as he walked into the hallway.

She walked out of one of the rooms and asked, "What is it Russ? It's late."

"I know, sorry but I have to go. My sister needs me right away. It's an emergency, I'll be back as soon as I can." He told her as he began walking towards the front door.

As he opened it she called, "Russell Baker I thought you didn't have any family!"

Ron chuckled darkly, "Russell Baker doesn't Rose, but I do."

He then shut the door behind him before she had a chance to ask any more questions. He had no idea what he was going to do but all he knew was that he had to help Ginny, Ginny was at Hogwarts, and so he must go to Hogwarts. The rest he would work out later.

--

The heavens opened and rain started pummelling down the next morning, quickly waking both Draco and Hermione from their sleep.

"Great! Just great, now we get to be lost _and _wet!" Draco yelled as he pulled his jacket tightly around him and both he and Hermione ran to the nearest tree for cover.

"It has to ease off eventually, we'll just wait until it does." Hermione said as she pushed away the hair that was plastered to her face from the wet.

An hour and a half later the rain had not eased off at all, if anything it had gotten worse. Draco was growing impatient, he had never been one to stand around when there was a task to be done plus the longer they stayed still the easier it became for them to be found. He pulled out his wand from the inner pocket of his robe and muttered 'point me'. The pair watched as the wand spun around a few times before stopping, the tip pointing directly to the north.

"Well then, that's they way we're going." He said firmly and set off in the direction the wand had shown him.

Hermione had to jog slightly to catch up with his long and determined strides.

"What are you doing?" She panted as she came up beside him.

"Taking action."

"But we need to find the railway tracks." Hermione protested.

"No we need to get to Scotland and last time I checked Scotland was north, so we head north we get to the portal. It's time a man took control of the situation."

"Yeah tell me when he gets here." Hermione muttered darkly under her breath so he could not hear.

"But if we get to Hogsmeade at least we'll know where we are and how far we have left to go if we just walk in a direction we could bump into anybody and anything, it could be dangerous." She argued.

"Don't worry I'm here to protect you." He told he, never once stopping or even slowing down, but looking to his wand every couple of minutes to make sure they were still heading dead north.

"And when did we go back in time fifty years to when it was expected of the male to look after the female. I've been in a lot more danger that you ever have so it should really be I protecting you." She shot him down, getting tired of his masculine line of thoughts.

For a long while Draco was silent before he said quietly, "I still think my idea's better."

"Well I think you're out to get us kill but then again what would I know I'm just a mere _woman, _can't match up to your manly ideas." She snapped but put her arm around his waist.

Soon enough they came to a road, they stopped at the edge of it.

"Put on your amulet, it'll be hard to explain why we don't have passports with us, it'll be even harder to explain why you're not wearing your amulet."

Hermione got it out of her pocket and slipped it on before they continued to walk and sure enough two guards soon stopped them - both wearing full deatheater uniform.

"Who goes there?" One questioned.

"Prepare your passports to be checked." The other boomed.

"We don't have them." Draco said quickly.

"We were robbed, bloody Mudbloods I don't doubt," Hermione interrupted, "Took our passports and any valuables we had on us, luckily we had left our bags in the inn we had been staying at else we would have nothing. We have our amulets though and only people on our side can wear them."

"What do you mean?" one of the guards asked.

"Didn't you know?" Hermione lied, "If a mudblood, halfblood or blood traitor puts it on the become covered in green boils. We learnt all about it in deatheater training, maybe it's a new thing."

Hermione shrugged and looked at the pair. The guards looked at one another briefly before giving a sharp nod. "You may pass, but I suggest that you sort out replacement passports others may not be as lenient as we are."

They quickly hurried past and as soon as they were out of hearing range burst in to laughter.

Luckily we got the stupidest guards in the world, where did you get the green boils from?" Draco asked.

Hermione went on to tell him about the 'sneak' incident of the DA in their fifth year and how that spell had been her inspiration for their escape.

--

Ron was slowly making his way down the same road, he had been going since that night when he had run from Rose and what had been his home for the past year and a half. He had not stopped to eat or find shelter from the rain so he was now soaked through, he cloak heavy from water and weighing him down. Every few steps his stomach would give a growl of protest reminding him that he hadn't eaten for a good sixteen hours. But no of this matter to him, he needed to continue down this road until he reached the crossroad, he would then go towards Hogsmeade from which it was just a short distance to the castle, he could go in through one of the secret passages, the one through Honeydukes, or what had been the sweet shop when he had been in school, would be the best as it would take him right into the building.

An hour later he finally came to the crossroad. He stopped and sat down, leaning against the signpost for a short break. Coming along the road he could see two figures coming towards him. He did not worry, he could tell from the way they were moving that they were not Dementors and the way they were dressed that they were not Deatheaters, probably just two purebloods out for a stroll, he decided. But as they drew closer he began to think that they looked vaguely familiar. He stood up and took a few steps toward the couple frowning when the girl stopped, frozen to the spot. But a few seconds later he understood why and he froze too.

"Hermione?" He whispered.

"R-Ron?" She croaked.

Suddenly they ran forward and wrapped their arms around each other.

"I thought you were dead!" Hermione sobbed into his shoulder.

"I had to get away it was too much, what with my family and Harry and everyone." He offered as a lame excuse. Hermione nodded and wiped away the tears from her cheeks.

"I've been trying to find you, Draco's been asking all the safe houses he knows." She told him and Ron stopped.

"Draco? As in Malfoy?" He asked, "What's he got to do with this?"

He then looked up and realised that the person with Hermione was his Hogwarts enemy Draco Malfoy.

"What the hell is he doing here?" He demanded.

"He wants to help Ron trust me, he's on our side I promise." She reassured him and Draco nodded, for once not wanting to cause a fight.

"But it's Malfoy Hermione!" He protested, obviously he _did _want to cause a fight. Hermione caught his face in her hands and turned him to look at her.

"I trust him Ron, he is on out side." She told him firmly and let go. "Now what are you doing here you look awful?"

"It's Ginny, Herms," he told her taking out the letter his sister had sent him and handing it to her, "She's in trouble."


	11. Back To School

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you –

Danish Pastry 28 – _thank you, and just to let you know I haven't ignored your spelling tips from last time, I go back and change them and I'll edit the whole story once it is finished. So thank you.  
_Onigiri Momoko,  
Mysteriouscharm,  
countrybutterfly  
xXWitchXx  
londonmalfoy  
epiphany-the-storyteller  
mhbf  
Lady Mariel

* * *

_**Chapter 11**_  
_**Back To School**_

"I never thought I'd be breaking _in _to a school." Draco grumbled as they made their way into the derelict streets of Hogsmeade.

Ron rolled his eyes and was about to say something in response when Hermione shushed them both and pointed ahead. A group of deatheaters were stood in deep conversation, their backs turned to Hermione, Ron and Draco.

"Great what do we do now, they're right outside Honeydukes!" Ron sighed as they crouched down behind a crumbling wall to keep out of sight.

"How can you tell?" Hermione asked. She looked around at all the ruined buildings, hardly any still had the shop signs up and if they did the words were barely legible.

"Honeydukes was two shops down from the Three Broomsticks. There's the pub, you can tell because it's bigger than the rest of the shops, so count two down and that's Honeydukes." Ron explained.

"Wow Weasly looks like all that traipsing around Hogsmeade looking at the things you couldn't afford did you some good." Draco teased and Hermione had to hold back Ron as he tried to lunge for him.

"Do you want to get us caught?" Hermione hissed in the most severe tone she could manage while keeping her voice down to a whisper.

The two men sighed and shook their heads remaining silent.

"Now what we need is a distraction." Hermione said looking around for inspiration. Something caught her eye.

A dummy that would have once been in the window of a clothes shop was lay upon the floor, pointing her wand at it Hermione shrunk it quite considerably and accio'd it over to them.

"What are you doing?" Ron asked as Hermione rooted through her bag and pulled out a black robe.

"I'm getting us into the school." She answered as she rubbed dirt into the material and ripped it in places. Once the robe looked worn and tattered she restored the dummy to its original size and placed the robes upon it.

"_Mobilicorpus._" She whispered and the dummy sprung into action, using her wand she made it run across the square and down an alley near to where the deatheaters were stood. They saw it and quickly ran after thinking that it was a real person.

"Now we don't have much time, when they catch it they'll realise it was a trick and come looking for us." Hermione hissed as they ran to the former sweet shop.

Once inside they had to move a lot of stones and rubble from where the door to the basement was so they were able to get through.

"They're back." Draco groaned as they reached the bottom of the stairs and could hear the shouts of the deatheaters somewhere above.

"Where is it?" Ron asked frantically searching the floor for the handle of the trapdoor.

The shouts seemed closer and their search became more frantic.

"Down here!" Came a rough and loud voice, footsteps followed and the noise of more rocks being moved.

"_Quick!_" Draco urged as he glanced nervously to the top of the steps where light was pouring in.

"Got it!" Ron exclaimed and yanked open the trap door.

He quickly jumped down, followed by Hermione and then Draco who shut it firmly behind him.

They didn't hang around to see if the Deatheaters would find them, as soon as their feet hit solid ground they began to run down the dark passageway. Hermione and Ron had been down it so many times before they did not need to light their wands to know where the corners and sharp turns were, Draco on the other hand was finding it quite difficult and had to go slowly in order to make sure he didn't walk smack into a wall.

"I wish we had Harry's cloak." Hermione sighed as they got close to the end of the passageway.

"Or the map." Ron added.

"What map?" Draco asked, he knew all about the cloak having found Harry in it in the sixth year.

Hermione quickly explained about the map that Fred and George had given Harry.

--

It was slow progress making their way along the hallways of the old school building as they only had their ears to alert them to on coming dangers. There were many times when they would have to run back in the direction they had been going in order to avoid being seen.

"Do you even know where we're supposed to be going?" Draco hissed to Ron as they turned yet another corner.

"Of course I do idiot, we need to get down to the dungeons but we can't take the main staircases as we'd get caught."

With Draco still grumbling they carried on down the tiny staircases until they finally reached the ground floor. From there they hurried down corridors, glad to find they almost al of them were empty, and got to the dungeons.

"How do we know which one she's in?" Hermione asked as the stared at a long line of closed wooden doors.

"I guess we'll just have to open them all." Draco said firmly and began yanking on the handle of the one nearest to him.

"Draco! Stop it, do you want to get us caught?" Hermione snapped and he let go, hanging his head.

"What about the guard?" Hermione asked pointing up to the distant figure of the deatheater at the other end of the cellblock, luckily he was out of hearing range.

"_Avada Kerdavra_" A green light shot down the room, illuminating everything as it passed and hit the deatheater on the side of his head. He fell to the ground with a heavy thud.

Hermione turned to look at Draco with shock, expecting to see his wand drawn but she saw he had the same look of fright upon his face too. She turned to Ron in time to see him stuff his wand back into his pocket.

"Ron!" She gasped.

"It was him or Ginny, there's no contest." He shrugged and walked off to begin opening doors.

For a few seconds Hermione couldn't move, she never thought she'd see one of her best friends use an Unforgivable, ever. She began to wonder what Ron had been through and whom else he had killed.

--

They found Ginny in one of the last cells they opened; she was curled up in a tight ball in the corner of the small room. Ron hurried to her side and the siblings embraced. Hermione and Draco stood by the door, looking in on them.

"Come on." Hermione whispered and pulled him away. They continued to open the rest of the doors to free the others in the cells.

With a loud bang the door that led out into the corridor was blown open and deatheaters began pouring in. Screaming and shouting began as spells flew through the air hitting the unarmed prisoners as they tried to escape. Ron and Ginny were quick to find Hermione and Draco and the three of them that had wands began defending the large amount that hadn't.

They were fighting a loosing battle though, there were fifteen deatheaters and only three of them, so soon they gave up and just ran.

"How are we going to get out?" Hermione yelled, not bothering to keep her voice down now the deatheaters knew that they were there.

"Well we can't use the grounds, there'll be guards." Draco replied, panting slightly at the speed that they were running. "And we can't use the passage we came in because of the deatheaters in Hogsmeade."

"So what do we do?" Ginny croaked, she was in a bad state she had had very little food in the time she had been in the cell.

"Fly." Ron said firmly and pointed to the wall.

Upon it was a large family crest of someone they did not recognise, there were two broomsticks in the centre of it crossed over to make an X shape. The brooms were real. Ron and Draco quickly pulled them down and looked at them.

"They'll do." Draco said quickly.

"Well they'll fly at least. Now where can we take off from?" Ron asked.

"Astronomy tower." Ginny sad quickly and they turned to the stairs.

They got all the way to the fifth floor before they were met by more deatheaters, a larger group this time at least twenty. They began to fight but were soon overpowered; Ron lay on the floor in a full body bind, so strong his couldn't even move his eyes. Draco was bleeding badly and Ginny was unconscious. A deatheater grabbed Hermione by the throat and slammed her against the wall. Her feet were inches off the ground and she tried to see if she could touch the floor if she went onto her tiptoes. The deatheater saw what she was trying to do and lifted her even further.

She gasped and struggled and kicked out at the man, clawing at the strong arm holding her trying to get him to let go, but nothing worked white dots started appearing in front of her eyes and her lungs burnt with lack of oxygen.

"Let her go." Another deatheater commanded. "I am under strict instruction to take these four and throw them off the top of the Astronomy Tower.

"Ses' who?" The deatheaters growled, but Hermione felt his grip loosen slightly.

"Orders from the Dark Lord himself. Do you defy him?" The second deatheater questioned.

"No, no! Never." Hermione was dropped to the floor and grabbed by the deatheater. Using his wand he made Ginny and Ron float behind him Hermione tried to turn around in his grip to see what had happened to Draco.

"Let me go!" She screamed and yanked at his arm hoping that he would let go if only for a second so she could run. She had no such luck, she watched as the deatheaters parted to make a path to the stairway that would take them to the tower.

"You must all stay here." The deatheaters holding her declared, "Voldemort wishes to kill them himself, you must wait down here until he arrives."

It wasn't until halfway up the staircase that he let her go and Draco took off the deatheater mask he had been wearing.

"Draco!" Hermione exclaimed and wrapped her arms around him she pulled away and hit him hard on the arm, "You scared me to death!"

"Ssshhhhhh! They'll hear you, now come on." He whispered and they continued up the stairs.

When they reached the top of the tower Draco let Ginny and Ron down to the ground and pointed his wand at them both, Ron and unbound and Ginny had water poured over her until she woke. Hermione then stopped him and using her wand she bandaged up his injuries.

"You saved my life again." She smiled as she held his face in her hands, "That's like the fourth time now."

"I'm a very handy person to have around." He smiled and lent down to kiss her.

A cough from behind them made the stop.

"Shall we get going then? It won't be long until they figure out it was a trick." Ron said as he picked up his broom. Draco took the miniature version of the broom out of his pocket and returned it to its normal size.

"Let's get going then. Come on Hermione. Hermione?"

Ron, Ginny and Draco all turned to look at Hermione who was frozen to the spot. They then all turned to look at where she was looking and gasped in shock.

"H-Harry?" Hermione whispered, looking at the ghost before them, not quite believing her eyes.


	12. Set Free

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thank you –

PandylBas  
countrybutterfly  
epiphany-the-storyteller  
mysteriouscharm  
Danish Pastry 28  
Onigiri Momoko  
Pip08

**A/N – **This may be one of the last chapters of this story, I'm not too sure yet I'll see how the next one turns out (that may even be the last one, possibly, excluding an epilogue). I'm currently planning a new HGDM fic; info about it is on my bio under the title of upcoming stories if you want to check it out. Thanks.

**WARNING: **This chapter contains references from the sixth book so if you haven't finished it and do not wish to know what happens don't read.

* * *

_**Chapter 12**_  
_**Set Free**_

"Harry? Y-you're a ghost?" Ginny stuttered not quite able to believe her eyes.

"'Fraid so." He sighed as he looked down at them; he was floating off the ground so his head was about a foot above them.

"Oh Harry!" Hermione cried and ran forward, trying to hug him forgetting that he had no corporeal form so ended up just running through him.

She flushed slightly with embarrassment as she turned back towards her friends. "But why are you still here? I thought only people who suffered a painful death came back as ghosts." she asked trying to move along the conversation.

"I have unfinished business I can't move on until Voldemort is dead and my mind can be put to rest."

"Does anyone else find this really weird?" Draco butted in, completely ruining the moment, "I mean even in death he has to be dramatic."

"Why is he here?" Harry snapped frowning at his former school enemy. "He's a deatheater, he was going to kill Dumbledore!"

"He's not a deatheater anymore Harry, he even helped me escape slavery and has saved my life but let's not get into that at the moment." Hermione tutted, "How do we kill him Harry? If you've been here for so long you must have overheard something?"

All four of them looked toward Harry hopefully, but he merely shook his head. "I can't leave this room, he put a spell on it or something, I can't further than a foot from the walls before I hit a barrier."

"Then what do we do?" Ron asked. "How do we kill him?"

"I don't know, but before he killed me I remember him saying something." Harry frowned trying his best to recall the memory. "Something about protecting himself and then something about my death aiding it. I think he made one last Horcrux after he killed me. He must have known that all the others had been destroyed."

"What could it be?" Ginny asked, "It could be anything we'll never find it!"

"No, it couldn't be anything. That's the point it was always something of value to him and it would have had to have been close by, he wouldn't have wanted to wait long to do it in case one of us lot had come back." Hermione said, straining herself to try to remember every detail she could that had been in the room that night.

"Well, well what a touching reunion this is!" A voice sneered from behind them, they all spun to see Voldemort's figure looming in the doorway. "Now how about I kill you all so you can join your precious Potter for ever and ever?"

"No way! An eternity with him! I'd rather go back to my parents!" Draco snorted and everyone in the room drew their wands.

Hermione is the first to send a spell hurtling through the air, the anger on behalf of Harry building up inside of her; she couldn't stand to think that he had been trapped for all the years gone by since his murder.

Voldemort quickly responded with an Unforgivable that was blocked by Harry rushing in front of it, it didn't harm him - he was already dead so he could die again.

A sudden flash of inspiration hit him as he watched his friends fight. "His wand!" he yelled, "I bet you it's his wand!"

"Expelliarmus!" Came four voices in near perfect unison, a blast coming from each wand, hitting Voldemort from different directions.

He was thrown back against the far wall with great might, his wand soaring off and hitting the ceiling as it continued on its path right over the edge of the tower.

Hermione ran forward and pointed her own wand down toward the one falling to the floor.

"Avis!" A huge bird flew from the tip of the wood and hurtled down, capturing the wand in its beak before turning to fly upwards again. It deposited it into Hermione's outstretched hand before disappearing in a wisp of smoke.

She shoved her own wand into her pocket and gripped Voldemort's in both fists.

"Do you know if you break a wand you're cursed for life!" He called before she had a chance to snap it.

She looked up at him, all his deatheaters were in rooms below, he had been too cocky to believe he needed back-up and now as he lay sprawled on the floor, bleeding and broken, no wand, no power, he just looked like a fragile old man. She pitied him.

"Look around you," She whispered, "This world _is _a curse."

In one sharp and swift motion she brought the wand down hard against her knee, smiling as it made a satisfying _crack _as the wood splintered and broke.

Before the Dark Lord even had chance to draw in a breath to shout for help Draco had put him in a full-body bind.

"So who wants to do the honours?" Draco asked as they all pointed their wands towards him.

"I'll do it!" Ron said quickly.

"No I think you've used enough Unforgivables to last a life-time." Hermione told him sternly, still shock at how easily he had killed the prison guard.

"When you watch your own father tortured and killed by these bastards you can tell me who I can and can't kill." He hissed, while giving the man laying before his a hard kick that was sure to have broken at least a couple of ribs.

"I still don't think we should sink to his level." She told them quietly.

"Well then you won't do it." Ginny said firmly as she tightened her grip on her wand, "But don't you want to? Honestly? Think about it, this is the guy whose fault it is that everyone we loved is dead, this is the guy who tried to sell us as slaves. This is the guy who _murdered _Harry!"

"You're right. We'll all do it." Hermione said, "All of us together no one deservers the pleasure more than another of us at killing this bastard. On the count of three."

_"One," _

_"Two,"_

_"Three!" _

With a blinding green light the four all shouted the killing curse, the words burning their throats as it made its way out of their mouths leaving behind the taste of hate and anger.

"Is he gone? Really gone for good?" Ginny asked eagerly.

"Only time will tell, we'll never know for sure if the wand really was a Horcrux or not." Draco sighed and crossed the room to wrap his arms around Hermione.

"You did it guys!" Harry said happily.

"No we did it mate," Ron grinned, "And we were bloody brilliant!"

Suddenly Harry began to glow, white light illuminating the whole room with such a glare it could have been mistaken for daylight.

"Merlin, we knew you were happy but no need to over do it." Draco muttered sarcastically, even when he and Harry were on the same side – fighting for the same cause – he couldn't bring himself to like him.

"What's going on?" Ginny asked, clinging to her brother's arm in fear.

"He has no more earthly ties, he's been avenged, he can finally move on to the higher plane, or where ever it is dead people go." Hermione whispered as they all watched in awe, as the light grew stronger.

Finally when it became to bright to look at and they were all wincing and shielding their eyes did it begin to grow smaller, taking Harry with it, until it was just a tiny pin prick of light, then disappearing with a pop.

They did not cry, they had already mourned for the loss of their best friend and even if they hadn't they were all far to exhausted at the time to be able to properly register what had happened.

--

The battle continued the other side of the door; the prisoners had found where their wands had been stored when they had been taken from them and had forced their way into the room.

"Finite Incantatem!" Draco yelled over the noise and everything below them stopped, frozen in mid action.

"I'm really not in the mood for fighting, I reckon the Order will be happy to rejoin to deal with this." Hermione said as she conjured a scroll, an inkpot and a quill. She quickly penned a letter and attached it to the leg of the bird that Ron had made, they watched as it flew over the frozen crowd and out the window.

"Come on!" Ginny nagged and they began to make their way through the people all silently praying that the spell wouldn't wear off and they would find themselves in the middle of a battle.

"I never remember it taking this long to get down stairs." Ron grumbled as they walked down the entrance hall. The word had already spread through out the castle that Voldemort was dead so the deatheaters were giving them wide birth.

As they reached the end of the path and hauled open the large gates separating Hogwarts from Hogsmade village Order members were already appearing to take over.

"What happened?" one asked breathlessly as they ran up to them.

"Voldemort is dead." Hermione said as she leaned on Draco for support.

"You killed him?" the woman asked, clearly amazed.

"No, that was the mistake we made last time, we left out friend without any back up. This time we were in it together." Hermione told her as she look at her friends, "I didn't kill him _we _did."

* * *

**_BETA READER WANTED _**

I am looking for a beta reader for a Hermione/Draco fiction I will be starting shortly.  
I need someone who checks their emails regularly and is happy to make suggestions for my work.  
If anyone is interested please e-mail me and I can send you a synopsis of the story to see if you'd be interested in betaing it for me.  
I plan to begin posting it once this story and 'Getting Over It' is completed.

Thanks. xxx.


	13. The Portal

**To Get Back Life

* * *

**

Thanks –  
epiphany-the-storyteller  
mysteriouscharm  
Pip08  
Siriusly Sirius Lily Black

* * *

_**Chapter 13  
The Portal**_

"So is this it now, is it all over?" Ginny asked as they made their way down the, now quiet, streets of Hogsmeade. All the deatheaters had gone to the school to back up the people already there and everyone else had shut the curtains and bolted the doors.

"No way, they're not as thick as they were last time. Voldemort prepared for this and they know just what to do even if he's not there." Draco said sadly.

"Some will drop out now Voldemort's not a threat though." Ron said, "I mean there are quite a few who were just too scared to cross him, I can't imagine they'll want to fight."

"But then there's all the ones who are completely loyal to him." Draco replied.

"Yeah and you'd know all about them wouldn't you Malfoy" Ron muttered under his breath, but loud enough so the others could hear.

Draco was about to open his mouth to reply but Hermione held up her hands an in a stern voice snapped. "Enough! I am sick to the back teeth of you two bickering like we're still in school. Grow up, I don't expect you to like each other, but as adults I expect you to be civil to each other ok? OK?"

They nodded quickly the second time she asked, thinking that she was extremely scary when she got angry.

"So we're still going to the portal then?" Ginny checked, they had run the plan past her earlier and she agreed that it sounded like the best thing to do.

"We're still going to the portal." Hermione confirmed.

"Not tonight though." Ron said, "We'll need our wits if we're going to sneak into it, we'll stay at the pub I work at tonight and go in the morning."

They followed his lead down the path until they got to the place where they would spend the night. An extremely worried Rose was behind the bar and rushed over to Ron when she saw him, pulling him into a tight, motherly hug.

"Oh Russ I was so worried!" She exclaimed.

The other three frowned.

"Russ?" Hermione questioned, "No you mean Ron."

Rose stopped hugging him and turned to face Hermione, "What in the name of Merlin's beard are you talking about girl?"

"That's Ron, Ron Weasley, you called him Russ."

"You _are _Ron Weasley?" She turned back to him, "Why did you tell me you weren't?"

"Why do you think? I wanted to get away from my old life, I hated all the pain and loss I wanted to see what it would be like to be normal for a while." He told her sadly, "I'm sorry Rose I didn't mean to trick you but I never expected to stay more than a couple of weeks at the most."

"So this is Hermione Granger then? And Ginny, your sister?" She asked pointed to the two girls, then turning to Draco she said, "I'm sorry dear I don't know who you are."

"Yes that's them. Look Rose I'm tired can we talk about this in the morning? After we've all had some sleep." Ron begged and Rose gave in handing him three room keys.

The four trudged up the stairs and collapsed down on to their single beds, each in their own rooms. They woke the next morning to find that clean clothes had been left out for them, they were very grateful as the ones they were wearing were caked in grime and blood.

After showering they met downstairs in the bar, which was of course empty as it was not open, and recounted the tale of the previous night to a shocked and awe filled Rose.

"We have to go." Hermione said quietly as Ron reached the end of the story, "There'll be no shadows to hide in if we wait much longer."

The four of them stood up from the table and said their goodbyes to Rose, who by then was getting quite tearful she hugged them all and walked to the door to see them on their way.

It was a short walk to the portal and there were fewer than usual Deatheaters around, any that could be spared were down at the castle where the battle was still going on. This was a great convenience for them to start with, but it landed them in more trouble in the end. They became too cocky, sure of the fact that they were invincible and began to walk out in the open. So it was inevitable that they were going to get caught.

It happened just feet from the portal, there were five Deatheaters loading boxes of wands onto a cart, they were the wands of victims of their savage attacks that were to be sold over in France, the profits all going to them of course.

They saw Hermione, Draco, Ron and Ginny and had grabbed wands and sent the first curse shooting towards them before the four even noticed that they were there.

Draco was the first to react, living with his father for so long had taught him to have quick reactions as you never knew when Lucius was going to lash out in a fury. In an instant he was in front of the other three, wand drawn ready for the oncoming attack. Just seconds later the other three were ready and the fight began.

"You four!" one growled, "You're the ones who killed our master! We'll take great pleasure in killing you slowly and painfully."

"Bring it on guys, you can go and be with your master again." Ginny hissed clenching her wand so tight her knuckles were white and her nails were digging into her palm.

As usual they were outnumbered, but only by one more this time, this meant that apart from one of them, they were all fighting one on one. It was of course Hermione who had to fight two people at once. To start with she was doing well, attacking one while dodging the spells sent form the other but when she was caught off guard and a spell clipped the side of her right cheek. She tired to dodge the next but it hit her too causing her to fall to the floor. The Deatheaters stopped with the spells for a while and began kicking her instead, she couldn't breathe and with a loud crack she heard her ribs braking.

"Hey!" Draco yelled furiously pushing the Deatheater he had been fighting to the ground and racing over to where Hermione was being attacked. He knocked out the first using a spell and grabbing the second by the back of his robes and dragging him away from Hermione. Once he had floored this one too he rushed to Hermione's side to see how badly injured she was.

"Are you ok?" He asked her tenderly, helping her to sit up.

She took in a sharp gasp of pain as he touched her side where he bones had been broken.

"Here I can help you with that." He said, for once thankful that he had been doing a course in medicine and healing, he muttered a spell word he had been taught and her bones were fixed. She was then able to get to her feet.

"How many times have you saved my life now?" She asked with a chuckle, "I'm going to be in debt to you for the rest of my life at this rate."

"I could live with that." He whispered, brushing a stray strand of hair from her face.

By the time she had Ron and Ginny had finished off the last of the Deatheaters and joined them.

"So what do we do on the other side?" Ginny inquired, "I don't feel like doing that one again unless I have to."

Hermione suddenly had a flash of inspiration she pointed her wand at each of them, concentrating very hard and muttered a spell word that none of them knew.

"What did you do?" Ron asked looking across at her, completely unimpressed.

"We're invisible." She told him.

"Hate to break it to you Hermione but I can still see you."

"That's because we're all under the same spell." She explained.

"What spell? I was never taught a spell to turn us invisible, that's not fair!" Ginny chimed in.

"We weren't taught it, I made it up."

"Well why didn't you share it before, it could have got us out of quite a lot of bother." Ron asked exasperatedly.

"Because I didn't think it would work, I've never done it on a human before; I've only ever practised on things like brick before."

"Great so now we're guinea pigs to your spells, I had enough of that with Fred and George." Ron began to moan, "The amount of times they tried to slip me nosebleed nougats."

"Like seeing as none of us are dead yet and we don't know how long this will last can we go now and you can whinge later Weasley." Draco snapped and strode before the portal.

"Is that it?" Ginny asked, turning her nose up in disappointment.

They were stood looking at a tunnel in a brick wall.

"I expected something with a little more…" Hermione trailed off unable to find the right word to describe what she had been expecting to see.

"Oh well, a portal's a portal. They all work the same, now let's get out of this hell hole and get out lives back." Ron urged.

"OK we'll all go together, hand in hand." Hermione said grabbing hold of Ron and Draco, Ron grabbed hold of his little sister and they all stepped into the tunnel.

If it hadn't looked impressive the inside certainly made up for it. There were lights of all different colours zooming past them, swirling round and zigzagging past each other. They stopped and stared in awe at the lights before stepping forward and feeling the head rush as they were transported across the sea to where the other side of the tunnel was.

When they stepped out the found they were in a large warehouse filled with boxes of wands, spell books, robes and other items that had been stolen off of people.

"Are we still invisible?" Ron whispered to Hermione.

"I sure hope so." She hissed back as the door clanged open and two Deatheaters walked in.

They quickly ran to the closest pile of boxes, just in case the spell hadn't worked and they were all still visible. Once safely hidden they were able the find a gap to peer through.

"They're coming this way!" Ginny hissed in a panic and sure enough the footsteps on the cold concrete floor were getting louder as they came closer.

"Looks like we get to find out if you're spell works the hard way." Draco muttered to Hermione as they all slowly shuffled backwards looking for a way to escape.

The conversation going on between the Deatheaters could be heard, an argument, muttered so if someone were passing by outside the two of them wouldn't be heard.

They stood, with their backs against the wall waiting for pair to turn the corner and come face-to-face with them. Ginny screwed up her eyes in terror and Hermione sucked in her breath, not wanting to let it out again. After what seemed like a lifetime the Deatheaters turned the corner and stopped.

For several horrifying seconds the four believed that Hermione's spell hadn't worked and that they could be seen, but the realised that the Deatheaters were not actually looking at the but the boxes stacked next to them.

"How the hell did they get there?" one snapped as he walked over and ripped off the lid of the one on top. "We shifted them a week ago, we'll have to do it all over again."

As they got to work levitating all of the heavy boxes over to where the door was Ron grabbed hold of Ginny's arm, who grabbed Hermione, who grabbed Draco and together they inched their way towards the door as quietly as possible. There was one tense moment where Ron hit his foot against a stone and let out a little whimper of pain. The Deatheaters looked around and the four froze, completely motionless until finally the Deatheaters decided that they must be hearing things and resumed with their work.

Finally they were outside in the cool morning French sunlight.

"We did it!" Ginny exclaimed in delight once they were a safe distance away form the warehouse. "We're free of it all!"

"Don't you think we should have stayed?" Hermione asked, chewing on her bottom lip, feeling the guilt of leaving the other people to fight.

"We've done enough, we deserve this." Ron told her firmly. "Now we just need to find somewhere to stay. I know a couple of places that will help us for a couple of nights, it's where we used to send people once they go through the portal."

He began to walk proclaiming that he knew the directions as well as the back of his hand, they all began following him, unable to keep the smiles off their faces at their new found freedom.

Hermione felt a hand grab her and turn around to see that Draco had not moved from where he had been standing.

"So we made it." He said, squinting past her to where the sun was rising.

"Yes we did." Hermione grinned up at him. She then turned to look back at Ron and Ginny; they were waiting for them a little further down the road in a happy animated conversation. "We should go, get a room in this place Ron knows we don't want to have to spend our first night on the streets."

"I know we'll go in a minute." He told her, he looked a little distracted.

"What's wrong?" Hermione asked cupping his cheeks in her hands and turning his face to look at her.

"It's just we're here now, you can get on with your life, you don't need me any more." He told her sadly.

"What do you mean?"

"You needed me as a way to escape and get to where we were going, and now we're there." He pulled away from her grasp and walked back down the road a short distance.

"Draco," Hermione called and caught up with him grabbing his arm and turning him to face her, "I will always need you." She told his firmly as she pulled his head down to hers to kiss him.

"After all," She added with a grin as they broke away, "Who else is going to save my life all the time?"

_**The End**_


End file.
